(Image: Jennifer Read, Natural Resources Canada)
Discovering a new species can be like searching for a needle in a haystack, so imagine the quest that turned up this new-found microscopic wasp, dubbed Tinkerbella nana. John Noyes of the in London captured it by sweeping a mesh net through vegetation at Costa Rica’s . He then combed through the leaf litter to spot this petite parasite.
At only 250 micrometres long, the fairy fly measures two-and-a-half times the width of a human hair. Its delicate, bristly wings may look ineffective, but they could help the minuscule bug to fly: the reduced surface area may reduce turbulence and drag on the wings.
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But how small can bugs go? The smallest flying insect found to date is a Hawaiian relative, the Kikiki huna Huber fairy fly, which measures a mere 150 micrometres. At the other end of the scale, Atlas moths have wingspans up to 25 centimetres.
Fans of tiny animals should take a look at the world’s smallest vertebrate, enormous in comparison, and take heart from the trend for climate change to cause animals to shrink.
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