First host record, nesting behavior, and taxonomic position of the spider wasp genus Hesperopompilus Evans and some other Evans genera (Hymenoptera: Pompilidae)

Authors

Frank E. Kurczewski, Atlanta, GAFollow
Rick C. West, Sooke, BC, CanadaFollow
James P. Pitts, Utah State University, Logan, UTFollow

Document Type

Article

Date of this Version

10-28-2022

Citation

Kurczewski FE, West RC, Pitts JP. 2022. First host record, nesting behavior, and taxonomic position of the spider wasp genus Hesperopompilus Evans and some other Evans genera (Hymenoptera: Pompilidae). Insecta Mundi 0960: 1–8.

Comments

Copyright held by the author(s). This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons, Attribution Non-Commercial License,

Published on October 28, 2022 by Center for Systematic Entomology, Inc. P.O. Box 141874 Gainesville, FL 32614-1874 USA http://centerforsystematicentomology.org/

Abstract

First host record, prey transport, and burrow excavation are described for Hesperopompilus sp., an undescribed, rare spider wasp (Hymenoptera: Pompilidae) from Texas. Taxonomic, ecological, and behav­ioral examination of the genus subsequently led to an investigation of the previously related Perissopompilus Evans and Xerochares Evans. Taxonomic, host preference, nesting behavior, and phylogenomic relationships of the three taxa are discussed along with those of Xenopompilus Evans. The molecular connection of Perisso­pompilus and Allochares Banks is supported by their common use of host species of Filistatidae.

Evans (1951), in his taxonomic study of the spider wasp tribe Pompilini (Hymenoptera: Pompilidae: Pompilinae), described the comparatively rare subgenera Xerochares and Perissopompilus and re-described the comparatively rare genus Hesperopompilus Evans (1948), grouping these taxa adjacently in the large worldwide genus Pompilus Fabricius. Pompilus resembles Anoplius Dufour in many structural features but can be distinguished from that genus in the female by the absence of stiff bristles on the apical metasomal tergum and in the male by the toothed tarsal claws (Evans 1951, 1966a; Wasbauer and Kimsey 1985). Evans (1953, 1960, 1968) later described and added the rare subgenus Xenopompilus to this group of three subgenera, rearranging them in Pompilus in the follow­ing phylogenetic order: Hesperopompilus, Xenopompilus, Perissopompilus, and Xerochares. Krombein (1979) and Wasbauer and Kimsey (1985) reaffirmed Evans (1951, 1966a) subgeneric arrangement in Pompilus despite the attempts of European workers, notably Day (1981), to elevate the four subgenera to genus status. Evans (1990), in agreement with Krombein (1979) and Wasbauer and Kimsey (1985), referenced Pompilus silvivagus Evans. However, Evans (1997) listed the genera Hesperopompilus and Arachnophila Kincaid, including Arachnospila (Ammosphex) silvivaga (Evans), in his Spider Wasps of Colorado following Day’s (1981) narrow interpretation of Pompilus, with little explanation of their elevated generic status. Hesperopompilus, Xenopompilus, Perissopompi­lus, and Xerochares were classified thereafter on multiple websites (e.g., BugGuide, Flickr, iNaturalist) as genera, not subgenera. Finally, the four subgenera established by Evans (1948, 1951, 1953) were treated as separate gen­era by Pitts et al. (2005), Horta-Vega et al. (2009), Wasbauer and Kimsey (2010), Castro-Huertas et al. (2014), Waichert et al. (2015), Rodriguez et al. (2015), and Fernández et al. (2022) based on morphological, host prefer­ence, nesting behavior, and, especially, phylogenomic criteria.