Westwoodia

Arnett, R. H. Jr., Samuelson, G. A. & Nishida, G. M. (1993) Insect and Spider Collections of the World. Second Ed. Sandhill Crane Press, Gainesville, 310 pp.

Davis, G. C. (1897) A review of the Ichneumonid subfamily Tryphoninae. Transactions of the American Entomological Society, 22, 193–348.

Gupta, V. K. (1987) The Ichneumonidae of the Indo–Australian area (Hymenoptera). A synonymic catalogue of the taxa described through 1985 together with a bibliography, 1960–1985 (Part 1. Subfamilies Pimplinae to Mesochorinae). Memoirs of the American Entomological Institute, 41(1), 1–597.

Lewis, R. H. (1837) Case of maternal attendance on the larva by an insect of the tribe of Terebrantia, belonging to the genus Perga, observed at Hobarton, Tasmania. Transactions of the Entomological Society of London, 1, 232–234.

Lewis, R. H. (1839) Various observations on the natural history and entomology of Van Diemen’s Land. Proceedings of the Entomological Society of London, 2, xliv–xlv.

Morrow, P. A., Bellas, T. E. & Eisner, T. (1976) Eucalyptus oils in the defensive oral discharge of Australian sawfly larvae (Hymenoptera: Pergidae). Oecologia, 24, 193–206.

Provancher, L. (1875a) Les Ichneumonides de Québec. Naturaliste Canadien, 7, 328–329.

Roman, A. (1912) Die Ichneumonidentypen C. P. Thunbergs. Zoologiska Bidrag fran Uppsala, 1, 229–293.

Schmidt, S. & Smith, D. R. (2006) An annotated systematic world catalogue of the Pergidae (Hymenoptera). Contributions of the American Entomological Institute, 34(3), 1–207.

Weinstein, P. & Austin, A. D. (1995) Primary parasitism, development and adult biology in the wasp Taeniogonalos venatoria Riek (Hymenoptera: Trigonalyidae). Australian Journal of Zoology, 43, 541–555.

Yu, D. S. & Horstmann, K. (1997) A catalogue of World Ichneumonidae (Hymenoptera) Part 1: Subfamilies Acaenitinae to Ophioninae. Memoirs of the American Entomological Institute, 58(1), 1–763.

Yu, D. S., van Achterberg, K. & Horstmann, K. (2005) World Ichneumonoidea 2004. Taxonomy, biology, morphology and distribution. Taxapad 2005.

Zhaurova, K. (2006) A revision of Physotarsus Townes, With a Preliminary Phylogenetic Analysis of Scolobatini (Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae: Ctenopelmatinae). M.S. Thesis Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas, 162 pp.

Gauld (1984) stated that Australian species of Scolobatini attack sawflies of the family Pergidae and listed a single host for Westwoodia: a specimen of W. ruficeps labelled as having been reared from Pseudoperga sp. The record in question may refer to either Pseudoperga or Pergagrapta Benson (= Pseudoperga Ashmead not Pseudoperga Guerin-Méneville) since confusion in use of the name Pseudoperga was not clarified until after Gauld (1984) (Schmidt & Smith 2006). Label data on the material examined provide two specific host records for W. ruficeps, namely Pergagrapta spinolae (Westwood) and the somewhat polyphagous Pergagrapta polita (Leach) on Eucalyptus propinqua H. Deane & Maiden and Melaleuca quinquenervia (Cav.) S. T. Blake. Behavioral observations on pergids being attacked by ichneumonids (Lewis 1837, 1839; Morrow et al. 1976), host plant data on some specimens, and host plant records in Schmidt & Smith (2006) also suggest the possibility of either Pseudoperga lewisii (Westwood) and/or P. guerinii (Westwood) as hosts. On this basis we predict that P. lewisii is a host of W. ruficeps in Tasmania where the species was first collected and described.

Weinstein and Austin (1995) reared several individuals of an undetermined species of Westwoodia from Perga dorsalis Leach feeding on two species of Eucalyptus L’Hér. The single individual we examined from their study is a specimen of the species described below as W. romani. A second individual of W. romani was reared from an unidentified pergid by Raff, about a year after Raff published what appears to be her last work on pergid sawflies and their parasitoids (Schmidt & Smith 2006).

Thus, limited data on hosts are available only from W. ruficeps and W. romani. Published records and unpublished label data all point to hosts being restricted to Perginae (i.e., Pseudoperga, Pergagrapta, and Perga Leach) feeding on either species of Eucalyptus or the related myrtacean genus Melaleuca L.

Gauld (1984) suggested that species of Westwoodia have exceptionally large eggs. The eggs of a specimen of Westwoodia that he dissected were ellipsoidal and 0.6X the length of the ovipositor; there were 109 eggs in the metasoma. We compared eggs from one of the female specimens of W. ruficeps with those from specimens of Netelia Gray and Xorides Latreille collected in Texas, and those of Westwoodia were several times smaller and much more numerous. The observations in Gauld (1984) are still valid relative to the ovipositor, but a more detailed comparison of egg size in ctenopelmatines is needed to put the Westwoodia eggs in proper perspective.

See Zhaurova and Wharton (2009).

head predominantly orange to yellow, quadrate, with vertex and gena polished, unsculptured or with weak, sparse punctation. clypeus ventrally more or less truncate, without median tooth. mandible with ventral tooth distinctly longer than dorsal tooth. first flagellomere with ovoid tyloid (1) patch on basal 0.2–0.4, patch not quite extending to margin above annellus, containing large number of irregularly arranged plate sensilla. fore tibia with apical tooth; tarsomeres 1–4 with fleshy ventral pads, at least apically; claws simple. fore wing with or without areolet; Rs+2r arising near base of stigma. First metasomal segment with sternite (S1) short, reaching 0.3–0.4 of distance to spiracle; glymma present, deep but narrow; T1 laterotergite (1, 2) expanded, bare. ovipositor short, with dorsal notch. Relative to other members of the tribe from Australia, the very short first metasomal sternite (S1) is a feature shared only with some species of the much more heavily sculptured Dictyopheltes Gauld. The small but deep glymma is better developed than in Pergaphaga Gauld and Dictyopheltes, but not as large as in Hypopheltes Cushman.

Known only from Australia. Specimens are rare.

Brullé (1846) based Westwoodia on a single female specimen collected from Tasmania. Provancher (1875) included Westwoodia in a key to genera of Pimplides and added a short diagnosis which unfortunately omitted the distinctive features of the genus noted in Brullé (1846). Provancher (1875a) also described the North American species Westwoodia fumipennis Provancher. Ashmead (1900) implied that the Westwoodia of Provancher was not the same as Westwoodia Brullé by including both in a list of ichneumonid genera. Morley (1913) did not consider W. fumipennis to be congeneric with W. ruficeps Brullé, and finally Townes (1945) formally removed W. fumipennis from Westwoodia. Unfortunately, Davis (1897) based his redescription of Westwoodia on the North American species W. fumipennis, and Ashmead (1900) incorrectly used longitudinally striate abdomen as a defining feature. Roman (1912) noted problems characterizing the genus when he initially suggested that the type species, W. ruficeps, might be a synonym of a braconid descibed by Fabricius, but then retracted this statement in a footnote at the end of his paper. Morley (1913) and Roman (1915) provided the first useful redescriptions of Westwoodia, and both added new distributional data. Morley (1913) noted morphological similarities to the European Scolobates Gravenhorst and Holarctic Opheltes Holmgren; Roman (1915) placed Westwoodia in the small subtribe Scolobatina with the European Scolobates and a third genus, Scolobatina, which Roman described as new based on a single male from an unknown locality in Australia. Roman (1915) provided a detailed key separating the three genera, and gave additional information on the type species of Westwoodia. Townes et al. (1961) placed Westwoodia in Mesoleiini while retaining Scolobates in Scolobatini, thus retaining the two in the same subfamily while rejecting the closer relationship implied by Roman’s (1915) classification. Townes (1970) subsequently presented a new classification of Ctenopelmatinae (= Scolobatinae of Townes). He redescribed Scolobatina and Westwoodia and included them with two other genera in his newly described Westwoodiini, while placing the widespread Scolobates and two New World genera in a separate tribe, Scolobatini. Gauld (1984), noting problems with the classification proposed in Townes (1970), combined the westwoodiines and scolobatines into a single tribe, Scolobatini, and synonymized Scolobatina Roman, 1915 with Westwoodia Brullé, 1846. Zhaurova (2006) analyzed relationships among genera included by Gauld (1984, 1997) in Scolobatini and found two well-supported clades to which she applied the names Westwoodiini and Scolobatini.

Catalogs by Dalla (1901, 1902), Townes et al. (1961), Gupta (1987), Yu and Horstmann (1997) and Yu et al. (2005) all treat Westwoodia and confirm that the genus is thus far known only from Australia. Prior to the present study, there was but a single published host record: an unidentified species of Pseudoperga Guerin-Méneville (Pergidae) for W. ruficeps (Gauld 1984). Gauld (1984) reported that he had seen specimens from all states except Northern Territory but did not provide specific localities. Prior to the work of Zhaurova (2006), the only specific locality records for Westwoodia were from Tasmania (the type locality), Fremantle (WA), Adelaide, and “near Melbourne” (Brullé 1846, Morley 1913, Roman 1915). Gauld (1984), when redefining Westwoodia, noted that he had seen four species, though only two were described. Although only a few additional specimens have been acquired since Gauld’s (1984) study, the morphological variation among species is considerable.

Tarsomere shape (Figs 46–57) and the setal patterns of the coxa (Figs 58–59), tibia, and tarsus are important defining features for the species of Westwoodia. Until the work of Gauld (1984), Westwoodia had been characterized in part on the basis of the short, broad tarsomeres (Figs 46–49, 57) of the only known species, W. ruficeps. Scolobatina ruficeps Roman, transferred to Westwoodia and renamed by Gauld (1984) has long, slender tarsomeres (Fig. 54), as do other species described here (Figs 52–53, 55–56). In W. ruficeps, tarsomeres 1–4 are short and broad, with those of the fore leg more distinctly so than the hind leg and much more so in females than males. In addition to size and shape differences, there are differences in setal patterns and the fleshy ventral pad. Westwoodia ruficeps exhibits the most derived states, with marked loss of setae and the presence of exceptionally large, inflatable pads on tarsomeres 2–4 (Fig. 47). Outgroup taxa have slender and uniformly setose tarsomeres with no evidence of ventral pads.

Westwoodia Brullé, 1846: 126–128. Type species: Westwoodia ruficeps Brullé, 1846, by original designation.
Scolobatina Roman, 1915: 4. Type species: Scolobatina ruficeps Roman, 1915, by original designation. Synonymized by Gauld (1984), who also renamed the type species Westwoodia longipes.

The insightful synonymy of Scolobatina with Westwoodia (Gauld 1984) is supported by the new species described below, which bridge the considerable gap between W. ruficeps and W. longipes. Inclusion of W. longipes in Westwoodia greatly expands the definition of the genus and renders homoplastic some of the character states previously used for separation of scolobatine genera. Thus, none of the previously published keys (Townes 1970; Gauld 1984; Gauld 1997) is adequate.

Westwoodia is a genus of parasitoid wasps in the subfamily Ctenopelmatinae. A neotropical genus of butterflies was known as Westwoodia but is now referred to as Xenandra.