Diptera.info

Posted by Ratatoskr on 24-10-2014 21:23

What species could this be?
Any ID getting it as close as possible to a species name is great for me.

Photographed in southern Spain in May.
Arid region with lots of fruit cultivations. Here it's in a garden with planted flowers.

Edited by Ratatoskr on 24-10-2014 21:24

Posted by Ratatoskr on 25-10-2014 22:55

John Carr wrote:
Sphex?

Heard that suggestion in another forum too.

Could it even be Ammophila sabulosa? or at least Ammophila sp.?

Posted by piros on 26-10-2014 11:22

No, it certainly is not Ammophila. Most likely to be Sphex s. str. or closely related genus.
Greetings,
Henrik

Edited by piros on 26-10-2014 11:25

Posted by piros on 26-10-2014 11:36

Upon a closer look, it could be Podalonia tydei female, but I can't quite see the shape of the fore tarsus, so this is just a guess.

Posted by Ratatoskr on 26-10-2014 13:22

I was actually looking at the hairiness on the front leg and couldn't find any Ammophila sp. that had the same characteristics as on my photo. I also looked at where the black starts out on the abdomen and the same problem there, all had much more black. But me being a complete amateur and having been told not to look at things like color, I thought that it probably differs between individuals and that mine was just very off.

I have several photos of this individual, none very good unfortunately, but I did try posting more than one photo from the start but could only post one.

Here comes another one, cropped and a bit edited, which I hope is what you are asking for.

Edited by Ratatoskr on 26-10-2014 13:23