Two new Aprostocetus species (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae: Tetrastichinae), fortuitous parasitoids of invasive eulophid gall inducers (Tetrastichinae) on Eucalyptus and Erythrina

Abstract

Two closely related new species of Aprostocetus Westwood (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae: Tetrastichinae) are described as fortuitous parasitoids of invasive gall inducers in two other genera of Tetrastichinae, Leptocybe

Parasitoids of the eucalyptus gall waspLeptocybe invasa(Hymenoptera: Eulophidae) in China

“…Aprostocetus causalis , a parasitoid of L. invasa in China, was described as a new species in 2014 [32]. However, the longevity of both sexes of this parasitoid in the laboratory was lower than the longevity found in a previous study carried out in Thailand [27], probably due to the different rearing method.…”

“…We presumed that this could be attributed to the population dynamics of Q. mendeli in Sichuan province, but this needs to be confirmed. Previous studies showed that Q. mendeli is a solitary idiobiont ectoparasitoid [15] while A. causalis and M. viggianii are solitary koinobiont endoparasitoids [32]. The competitive dynamics and mechanisms of both the ectoparasitoid ( Q. mendeli ) and endoparasitoids ( A. causalis and/or M. viggianii ) in L. invasa need to be studied.…”

“…Images of the parasitoid adults were taken with a Sony digital camera (DSC-HX60, Sony, Kyoto, Japan). Identification of the parasitoids was performed with keys [7, 15, 32] and confirmed by Prof. Chao-Dong Zhu and Dr. Huan-Xi Cao (Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China).…”

“…However, as mentioned above, the parasitic capacities of these parasitoids for L. invasa are different in these regions. Thus far, only Aprostocetus causalis La Salle & Wu (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae) and Quadrastichus mendeli Kim & La Salle (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae) have been reported to parasitize L. invasa in the Guangxi and Hainan provinces of China [10, 17, 32]. The number of parasitoid species of L. invasa and their parasitic capacities in the field are unknown.…”

New Communities on Eucalypts Grown Outside Australia

“…The highly invasive gall former, L. invasa , is attacked by local parasitoid species in eight countries so far (Protasov et al, 2008; Doganlar et al, 2013; Udagedara and Karunaratne, 2014; Yang et al, 2014) and by several spider species in China (Zheng et al, 2014). Local parasitoids also attack the wood borer, P. semipunctata , in Morocco, California, and South Africa (Fraval and Haddan, 1988; Hanks et al, 1997; Prinsloo, 2004) while its eggs are subject to predation by ants in Portugal (Way et al, 1992).…”