This dastardly Darwin wasp, with antennae curled like Salvador Dali’s moustache, is an ichneumon wasp, an Ophion species that parasitises moth caterpillars.
It looks like it might be Ophion obscuratus, the
cream-striped Darwin wasp, often active as darkness falls and strongly attracted
to lit windows at dusk, so that’s probably how it arrived in our living room
recently - through an open window on a mild autumn evening, as dusk falls
ever-earlier.
The genus is named after Ophion, a serpent-king who, in
ancient Greek mythology, ruled the cosmos from Mount Olympus.
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