Walking down the Almond Track to the huerta yesterday, I spotted not one but three different galls on separate oak trees. The first to catch my eye was the red alien spiky shape, when I walked slower and looked closer at the trees I found more. About the size of a Malteser, the red one is as shiny as freshly-painted red nail lacquer. The second one I found was the biggest, golf-ball sized and textured, it looks older, wrinkled, rougher. The third is the size of the first and the colour of the second. It left me with many questions, so back home with a cup of coffee I perused our insect book. The female wasp, which I did not see, lays her eggs in the tissue of the tree which surrounds the egg with plant tissue which protects and nurtures it. So basically, it’s just another cuckoo! Another of nature’s parasites. There are 360 types of gall wasp or gall fly in Europe alone, 1300 worldwide. This is the first time I’ve seen galls here, so I don’t know how rare they are.  I have no idea which type of gall wasp chose our oak trees, or whether the three galls belong to the same type of wasp. Why is one red? Is it a reaction by the plant that makes the colour? It’s an aggressive, dangerous colour, though at first glance it looks like a squished berry.
5 to remember
la agalla – gall
la avispa – wasp
el/la extraterrestre – alien
con puntas – spiky
la forma – shape

‘Insects, Spiders and Other Terrestrial Arthropods’ by Dorling Kindersley

And if you’d like to tweet a link to THIS post, here’s my suggested tweet:
Gall wasps: mysterious… fascinating #Spain via @Spanish_Valley http://wp.me/p3dYp6-wu