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Wasps and HornetsMicroscopic biting winged insect
Please identify the insect in the attached photo. It is microscopic and bites.
Charlie
Hi Charlie,
Small, as small as 1mm, biting, flying gnats in the family Ceratophgonidae are known as No-See-Ums or Punkies. They are small enough to pass through normal window screening and their bite is proportionally 1000s of times greater than their size. We believe that this specimen might be one of the No-See-Ums, but the squashing is not helping our identification. Eric Eaton wrote in and made the following correction: “The squashed no-see-um is actually a hymenopteran. The fringes on the wings help ID it, along with the long antennae. It is one of the chalcid wasps commonly called a Fairy Fly. Fairy flies are the smallest of all known insects, and are parasitic in their larval stage on other insects. Eric”
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