Posted by
Gordon on 10-07-2009 09:33
#1
These were collected by a colleague of mine from Southeastern Romania; Dobruja on the 6th July 2009, dry grassland. Having brought them back hoping for microhymenoptera he was surprised when what looks like diptera larvae climbed out, quite a few of them and nothing else. They look like small ootheca to me. Anyway we are going to try for a photo of the actual larvae later.
Edited by
Gordon on 10-07-2009 09:42
#3
If this is some kind of ootheca, then the larvae crawling out may not necessarily belong to the organism making the ootheca. They could be 'inquilines' (not likely though) or parasitoids. Depending on what the orginal ootheca come from there might be chloropids or phorids that parasitese them, but there could even be others. If they are parasitoids, the larvae will be mature and probably pupate soon after.
Still, I might be off completely but then undoubtedly someone will prove me wrong.