New Zealand Journal of Zoology abstracts
Morphological and colour differences between subspecies of Sphecophaga
vesparum (Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae)
JOCELYN A. BERRY
Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research
Private Bag 92170
Auckland, New Zealand
RICHARD J. HARRIS
PETER E. C. READ
Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research
P.O. Box 69
Lincoln, New Zealand
BARRY J. DONOVAN
Donovan Scientific Insect Research
Private Bag 4704
Christchurch, New Zealand
Abstract Sphecophaga vesparum (Curtis), an ichneumonid
parasitoid of vespid wasps, has been introduced into New Zealand for the
biological control of
Vespula species.
S. vesparum is divided
into two allopatric subspecies:
S. v. vesparum (Curtis) from Europe, and
S. v. burra (Cresson) from North America.
S. v. vesparum has been
released over most of New Zealand since 1987, and is established at two sites.
S. v. burra was released in the field at one site in 1979 and failed to
establish. It is now being held in quarantine pending re-release.
Establishment success and distribution patterns of the two subspecies will be
studied in future, so a morphological study was carried out to determine
whether they could be reliably distinguished. We examined 164 specimens of
S. v. vesparum and 87 specimens of S. v. burra, and scored 13
characters. Results showed that the two subspecies could not be reliably
discriminated on any morphological characters, but that three colour characters
gave >98% separation for females (not including the character originally
used to define the subspecies), and seven colour characters gave 100%
separation for males. A key for separating the subspecies is presented. A
further strain from Israel was examined, and appeared to differ morphologically
from the European and North American subspecies, but too few specimens were
available for definitive conclusions.
Keywords Vespula; common wasp; German wasp;
Sphecophaga vesparum; biological control; morphology; colour
Received 1 April 1996; accepted 12 August 1996
New Zealand Journal of Zoology, 1997, Vol. 24: 35-46
0301-4223/2401-035 $2.50/0 (c) The Royal Society of New Zealand
1997
PDF file of entire paper: medium quality (1356K); (scanned from paper original: notes about this process)
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