Document Type
Article
Publication Date
1986
Publisher
Psyche: A journal of entomology
Abstract
Early in 1984, while conducting field studies on embiid behavior in the Arima valley of northern Trinidad, the junior author ob- served a braconid wasp ovipositing into the silk webs of an embiid, Clothoda urichi (Saussure) [Clothodidae]. The wasp and a paralyzed embiid were collected, and another wasp was successfully reared from that host. Specimens were sent to the senior author, then stationed at the National Museum of Natural History (USNM), who determined it to be a new braconid genus. A search of the USNM collection yielded no comparable specimens; however, during a subsequent search of the Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ) collection a specimen of a different, but related, species was found. Shenefelt (1980) provided a comprehensive index to recorded braconid hosts, which does not include any Embiidina. Callan (1952) mentioned that he collected numerous white cocoons from embiid webs in Trinidad, and he reared a braconid from these which was identified only as "Apanteles sp." He suggested that these were parasites of lepidopterous larvae that sometimes live under the silk, not parasites of the webspinners. The establishment of this new genus as a parasite of webspinners therefore provides a totally new host order record for the family Braconidae.
Recommended Citation
Shaw, S. R. and Edgerly, J. S. 1986. A new braconid genus (Hymenoptera) parasitizing webspinners (Embiidina) in Trinidad. Psyche. 92: 505-511.
