Jewel wasp

I spotted this tiny jewel wasp on the pond sedge in the wildlife pond this afternoon, during a brief cloudy spell in an otherwise sunny day. It was running around the gently waving leaves like a thing possessed, and (as they tend to do) frantically quivering its antennae - all of which was a bit of a problem, given the relatively poor light and the slowish shutter speed I was having to use. On the plus side though, with a creature as reflective as this flat light makes for better images, and with so much subject movement going on, separating the ten sharp shots from the three hundred or so duds was a pretty straightforward task.

The Chrysididae are notoriously difficult to identify from photos, so I'd rather you didn't quote me on this, but I'm going to take a guess that the little chap is Pseudomalus auratus. This is a common species in the UK, especially in the south of England, though at only around 5mm long it would be easy to overlook. It's thought to be a kleptoparasite of certain species of thread-waisted wasps, which catch aphids and leave them as food for their larvae. In order to invade a thread-waisted wasp's nest, the cuckoo wasp lays its own eggs inside living aphids, some of which will then go on to be predated. Once inside the nest the cuckoo wasp egg hatches from the aphid, and the larva kills and eats the host.

R: C1 D3.