{"id":7758,"date":"2026-06-16T09:25:03","date_gmt":"2026-06-16T09:25:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/?p=7758"},"modified":"2026-07-23T17:21:50","modified_gmt":"2026-07-23T17:21:50","slug":"2026-06-rare-spider-hunter-on-the-swedish-trail-en","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/posts\/2026-06-rare-spider-hunter-on-the-swedish-trail-en\/","title":{"rendered":"Mistaken identity: Discovering a rare spider-hunter on the Swedish trail"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Meet <em>Oxyrrhexis<\/em>, a rare and fascinating genus of parasitoid wasps belonging to the family <em>Ichneumonidae<\/em>. These miniature assassins function as &#8220;koinobiont ectoparasitoids,&#8221; a scientific term for a truly sci-fi lifecycle: females lay their eggs directly on living cobweb spiders (<em>Theridiidae<\/em>). Incredibly, the spider continues its normal life and web-building activities while the wasp larva slowly feeds on it from the outside. Measuring between 3 and 8 millimeters, the adults exhibit massive size variation, which is entirely dictated by the size of the unfortunate host they were reared upon. I encountered this tiny wasp during my bicycle tour through northern Sweden. I initially mistook its delicate profile for a common sawfly, only to later realize I had crossed paths with a highly specialized, rare spider-hunter!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Meet Oxyrrhexis, a rare and fascinating genus of parasitoid wasps belonging to the family Ichneumonidae. These miniature assassins function as [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":7759,"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":[84,433,82],"tags":[],"countries":[63,76],"order-category":[439,60,420],"class_list":["post-7758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mimickry","category-parasitoids","category-pollinators","countries-europe","countries-sweden","order-category-insects-wasps-ants-bees-sawflies-ichneumon-wasps","order-category-insects","order-category-insects-wasps-ants-bees-sawflies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7758","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=7758"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7758\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7764,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7758\/revisions\/7764"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7758"},{"taxonomy":"countries","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/countries?post=7758"},{"taxonomy":"order-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pawel.stefanoff.pl\/bugs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/order-category?post=7758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}