Cryptes baccatus

Wattle Tick Scale at Gundaroo, NSW

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Identification history

Cryptes baccatus	21 Jun 2017	MichaelMulvaney
Cryptes baccatus	21 Jun 2017	Heino
Badhamia sp.	15 Jun 2017	MaartjeSevenster
Unidentified	15 Jun 2017	MaartjeSevenster

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User's notes

I think this is Badhamia ?

4 comments

KenT wrote:

16 Jun 2017

I think the ants tending the white globes is the clue here. Badhamia is a slime mould genus which doesn't look quite right in the context presented here. The white things look like one of the scale insects (perhaps a species of Eriococcus?) and the ants are coming to their secretions.

MaartjeSevenster wrote:

17 Jun 2017

That may very well be right - I came across Badhamia as a tentative identification ages ago and recall that the ants seemed to make sense then but I now can't find anything suggesting ants would like it.

Heino wrote:

21 Jun 2017

Further to Ken's comment, on page 135 of Roger Farrow's 'Insects of south-eastern Australia' I found a photo of ants attending Cryptes baccatu, a scale that looks like the subject of this sighting and then found several sightings of this scale species on Canberra Nature Map.

KimPullen wrote:

1 Jul 2017

The ants by the way are Meat ants, Iridomyrmex purpureus.

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