{"id":10767,"date":"2026-09-05T14:30:25","date_gmt":"2026-09-05T14:30:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/?p=10767"},"modified":"2026-09-06T18:55:23","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T18:55:23","slug":"2026-09-soil-recycler-tiger-crane-fly-en","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/posts\/2026-09-soil-recycler-tiger-crane-fly-en\/","title":{"rendered":"Harmless stilted walkers and soil recyclers: The world of the tiger crane fly"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sporting bold yellow-and-black tiger stripes, the tiger crane fly (<em>Nephrotoma scurra<\/em>) looks like a giant mosquito at first glance. Measuring 15 to 20 millimeters long with extraordinarily slender, stilt-like legs, this eye-catching fly is entirely harmless. Females feature a pointed, needle-like tip at the end of their abdomen\u2014not a stinger, but a gentle egg-laying tool designed to deposit eggs directly into damp soil. Widespread across European grasslands and hedgerows, these delicate insects are often misunderstood. Despite urban legends calling them &#8220;mosquito hawks,&#8221; they don&#8217;t bite humans, carry venom, or hunt mosquitoes! In fact, adults feed lightly on flower nectar, while their soil-dwelling larvae do the important ecological work of breaking down decaying plant matter. If a predator tries to grab them, they can effortlessly drop a leg to break free and fly away. I met this medium-sized female in a humid forest near Barkarby, Sweden. She graciously landed below a tree branch and hung suspended by just two legs for several minutes, giving me the perfect opportunity to capture a few photos of this acrobatic pose.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sporting bold yellow-and-black tiger stripes, the tiger crane fly (Nephrotoma scurra) looks like a giant mosquito at first glance. Measuring [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10768,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,488],"tags":[],"countries":[63,76],"order-category":[501,44,60],"class_list":["post-10767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-phytophages-herbivores","category-saprophages","countries-europe","countries-sweden","order-category-insects-flies-crane-flies","order-category-insects-flies","order-category-insects"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10767"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10767\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10771,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10767\/revisions\/10771"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10767"},{"taxonomy":"countries","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/countries?post=10767"},{"taxonomy":"order-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/order-category?post=10767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}