Not Thistledown Velvet Ant

bugman

April 29th, 2005 at 12:00 am

Tags

Velvet Ant and Unknown Spider
Thistle Down Velvet Ant. I’m not really partial to blondes, but this little lady caught my eye in the parking lot at work in Poway, San Diego County. Don’t worry, I resisted the urge to pet her. I know she packs a painful stinger. I’m also including an unidentified spider. He was about the same size as a full grown green lynx, which are abundant in this area. Possibly another type of lynx?
Love your site,
Bernard Davis

Hi Bernard,
Thank you so much for your great photo of the Thistledown Velvet Ant, also known as the Gray Velvet Ant, Dasymutilla gloriosa. This is a new species for our site. The wingless female does have a painful sting. She wanders about on the ground searching for sand wasp burrows. She lays her eggs there and the young Velvet Ant larva then feasts on both the larval wasp as well as the food source of paralyzed flies the female Sand Wasp provides for her young. Male Velvet Ants fly.

Ed. Note Update: (12/02/2005)
ID corrections, etc. I’ve just discovered your excellent site (directed there by “This is True”), and as a hymenopterist have a few comments: All of the “thistledown velvet ants” shown are actually Dasymutilla nocturna, not Dasymutilla gloriosa. The latter has the erect hairs somewhat sparser and more “untidy”, the body is a reddish brown, not black, and all the hairs are whitish (no black hairs), so the legs look whitish.
I hope these comments are useful.
Denis

Update: (04/02/2008) ID for insects
Hey, my name is Will, this is a list of the ID’s for the velvet ant page. image 38. Dasymutilla sackeni hope this helps a bit.