Assassins

I was thinking how there are so few insects in my garden this summer, apart from the blowflies that breed in the sheep paddock over the fence. There have been few interesting creatures, hardly any native butterflies, or ladybirds. Then suddenly these two appeared in front of me. I took both photos in less than a minute. Each insect gave me just a moment to get a single shot.

On the left is a robber fly, (aka assassin fly), and on the right is a red hunting wasp.  The fly uses those powerful legs and complex thorax to capture blowflies midair. The wasp paralyses spiders to feed to its young. Need I say that I love robber flies and hate hunting wasps?

More detail in full screen.