Shun'ichi Makino

Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute | FFPRI · Hokkaido Research Center

The parasitism of two groups of host-manipulating parasites of hornets was examined in Kyoto, Japan. Vespa mandarinia (661 individuals), V. simillima (303), V. analis (457), V. ducalis (158), V. crabro (57), and V. dybowskii (4) were collected either by bait trap or hand collection with an insect net, and examined for their parasites. An endoparasi...

Parasitic mites have thus far been recorded only rarely from vespine wasps. We found larvae of the erythraeid mite Charletonia southcotti feeding on hornets, mainly Vespa analis workers that had been collected with bait traps. The mite seemed to prefer hornets stylopized by Xenos spp. as hosts to non-stylopized individuals, since in collections mad...

Ticks are obligate blood feeders that parasitize a variety of vertebrates and can be serious pests for these animals. Due to public concerns about the risk of chemical controls, there is a high demand for biological control agents to reduce tick populations and the spread of tick-borne diseases. In this study, we observed tick predation by the pseu...

Social wasps, which are important agents of ecosystem services (as predators) and disservices (as stinging pests),were collected with Malaise traps in Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica) plantations in three regions of Japan (Tohoku, Shikoku, and Kyushu). Each region had 12 study stands that were categorized into the following four types based on...

Ovary contents and insemination status were examined in overwintered queens of Vespa mandarinia that were collected using bait traps in Ibaraki Prefecture, eastern Japan. Catches in the traps occurred from late April to early July in 1999, though they were few or rather sporadic in and after June. Fertilization rates were 100% in 1999, and 93% in 1...

We constructed a hazard map for oak wilt disease in Yamagata and Fukushima Prefectures, Japan, based on a logistic regression model. Within the framework of a regression model, we incorporated data from previously damaged areas on vegetation type, geography and meteorology, and pest immigration. We evaluated the predictive power of the model using...

We investigated the concentrations of radiocesium in epigeic earthworms, litter, and soil samples collected from forests in Fukushima Prefecture 6 months after the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant accident in 2011. Radiocesium concentrations in litter accumulated on the forest floor were higher than those in the soil (0-5 cm depth). The highe...

The nematode Sphaerularia vespae only parasitizes hornet queens and deprives them of fertility. To elucidate its transmission route, we observed the behavior of overwintered queens of Vespa simillima found around decayed logs of fallen trees—the principal hibernation sites for this species. We found that overwintered queens frequently visited those...

In many temperate terrestrial forest ecosystems, both natural human disturbances drive the reestablishment of forests. Succession in plant communities, in addition to reforestation following the creation of open sites through harvesting or natural disturbances, can affect forest faunal assemblages. Wild bees perform an important ecosystem function...

List of bee species and the number of individuals sampled in each forest stand. (DOC)

The community structures of Mesostigmata, Prostigmata, and Oribatida in the soil of broad-leaved regeneration forests and conifer plantations of various ages were assessed alongside soil and plant environmental variables using three response metrics (density, species richness, and species-abundance distribution). The density and species richness of...

Since the 1960s, Japan has become highly dependent on foreign countries for natural resources, and the amount of managed lands (e.g. coppice, grassland, and agricultural field) has declined. Due to infrequent natural and human disturbance, early-successional species are now declining in Japan. Here we surveyed bees, birds, and plants in four human-...

Although primary forests are important for biological conservation, the value of secondary forests for forest-dependent organisms needs to be evaluated when habitat restoration is required. We examined whether flower-visiting insects can use secondary forests as alternative habitats to primary forests. In particular, we compared assemblages of bees...

In a mutualistic relation between a potter wasp, Allodynerus delphinalis (Giraud) (Hymenoptera: Vespidae), and its specific parasitic mite, Ensliniella parasitica Vitzthum (Winterschmidtiidae), behaviour of the mite guarding the wasp and attacking their common natural enemy, Melittobia acasta (Walker) (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae), was examined.While m...

Insular ecosystems can be dramatically affected by alien species, and records of pre-eradication status are essential to evaluate the effects of eradicating alien species. Nishi-jima Island is a small island of the Ogasawara group on which the first program of complete eradication of alien herbivorous mammals (black rats and feral goats) will be co...

Background/Question/Methods Vast expanses of oak forests, particularly the stands of Quercus crispula, are defoliating because of the oak wilt disease (OWD). The OWD is a fungal infection caused by Raffaelea quercivora, which is carried by the vector beetle Platypus quercivorus. The disease was first reported in the 1930s, and its emergence has b...

A trap-nesting study provided the first documentation of brood parasitism in Dipogon nagasei and in D. iwatai. Dipogon nagasei was found to brood parasitize D. sperconsus, D. conspersus, D. inconspersus, and D. bifasciatus. Dipogon iwatai brood parasitized D. sperconsus, D. conspersus, D. romankovae, and Auplopus carbonarius. Both brood parasitic s...

In this study, the influence of individual cuticular hydrocarbons on nestmate recognition in Japanese hornets was investigated. Cuticular hydrocarbons were extracted from the individuals of several colonies of Japanese hornets, Vespa analis Fablicius (Hymenoptera: Vespidae), and analyzed by combined gas chromatography and mass spectrometry (GC-MS)....

The alien predatory lizard, Anolis carolinensis, has reduced the insect fauna on the two main islands of the Ogasawara archipelago in Japan. As a result of this disturbance, introduced honeybees are now the dominant visitors to flowers instead of endemic bees on these islands. On the other hand, satellite islands not invaded by alien anoles have re...

Abstract Tube-nesting bees and wasps were collected with bamboo tube nest traps in a cherry blossom forest and an old secondary forest in Tama Forest Science Garden in the western suburbs of Tokyo. Curtain type traps, in which bamboo tubes were vertically arranged, attracted more bees and wasps to nests than bundle type traps, in which bamboo tubes...

This is the first record of Xenos moutoni, a specialized parasite of hornets (Vespa spp.), in Korea. Among six Vespa species collected with bait traps in Andong, central South Korea, approximately 10% of female Vespa analis (gynes plus workers) were parasitized, whereas the other five species (V. crabro, V. mandarinia, V. simillima, V. ducalis, and...

1. In large-scale field surveys, a binary recording of each species’ detection or nondetection has been increasingly adopted for its simplicity and low cost. Because of the importance of abundance in many studies, it is desirable to obtain inferences about abundance at species-, functional group-, and community-levels from such binary data. 2. We d...

Crop pollination is an essential ecosystem service, which, when provided by wild pollinator species, can be negatively affected by human activities at a landscape scale. Various pollinator species can be affected by landscape factors and/or act at different spatial scales. We investigated whether different landscape factors at different spatial sca...

1. To infer the effects of forest aging on the abundance, genus richness and diversity, and genus composition of understorey parasitoids, we investigated the assemblages of braconids collected in Malaise traps in a chronosequence of secondary broad-leaved forests (4–128 years old) in the satoyama landscape in the cool-temperate region of central Ho...

Despite plant quarantine systems, many organisms have been unintentionally introduced by the rapid expansion of international trade. Xylocopa tranquebarorum, a large species of carpenter bee that nests in bamboo shoots, was introduced into Japan approximately 5 years ago and, along with its specifically associated mite, has established populations...

1. Tree harvesting, an anthropogenic disturbance, and natural disturbances, such as avalanches, windstorms, fires, and floods, drive forest reestablishment. Chrono-sequential changes in plant communities as well as reforestation caused by harvesting and natural disturbances can affect forest faunal assemblages. 2. The effects of reforestation age,...

Mutualism is a prominent interaction within ecosystems, yet most may actually be conditional. The symbiotic mite, Ensliniella parasitica Vitzthum, ingests the hemolymph of juvenile potter wasps, Allodynerus delphinalis (Giraud), but also protects them from a natural enemy, Melittobia acasta, and is transported to new nests in host pockets specializ...

The remote Bonin Islands, a unique theater of evolutionary plays, are in danger of ecosystem degradation, and many endemic species are threatened with extinction because of various invasive aliens. To stop and reverse, if possible, the process of degradation, scientists have been attempting to control the impacts and spread of aliens. Our aim is to...

An ecological survey of colonies of Polistes formosanus was conducted on Yoron Island, Kagoshima Pref., southern Japan. Nests and adults collected were inspected in the laboratory. All 16 colonies collected were built on the undersides of leaves of cycads. e mean height of nest sites was 1.54 m above ground. All 14 colonies in which we successfully...

Gastral rubbing on the nest pedicel by a Vespa analis founding queen is described based on observations conducted on a pre-emergence nest. The foundress turned around the pedicel, rubbing the pedicel with her gastral tip. This behavior is very similar to that reported in Polistes or other polistine genera, in which females apply ant repellents prod...

Crop pollination by animals is an essential ecosystem service. Among animal-pollinated crops, distylous plants strongly depend on animal pollination. In distylous pollination systems, pollinator species are usually limited, although flowers of some distylous plants are visited by diverse animals. We studied the pollination biology of common buckwhe...

As comunidades de colêmbolos nas plantações da conífera Cryptomeria japonica (cedro japonês) e florestas decíduas secundárias de várias idades foram investigadas para determinar até que ponto a conversão da floresta decídua em conífera afeta a riqueza das espécies e a composição das comunidades de colêmbolos no Japão central. Adensidade e a riqueza...

Natural forests are often replaced by invasive alien trees on isolated oceanic islands. Adequate eradication of invasive trees should be conducted with the goal of biodiversity conservation, because islands support many endemic organisms that depend on native forests. An invasive alien tree, Bischofia javanica Blume (Euphorbiaceae), has invaded and...

The parasite Xenos moutoni inactivates workers and castrates reproductives of the Japanese hornet Vespa analis. Using over 500 nests, we investigated the relationship between hornet nest size (number of cells) and the proportion of parasitized adults (i.e., prevalence) in central Japan. Over 3years, 36–48% of nests had more than one parasitized adu...

Some bees and wasps that host mites have peculiar pocket-like structures called acarinaria. These have long been considered as morphological adaptations to securely transfer beneficial mites into nests, and thus are thought to be the product of a mutualistic relationship. However, there has been little compelling evidence to support this hypothesis...

Natural vegetation is often replaced by invasive alien plants on isolated oceanic islands. To determine how invasive alien plants affect insect diversity, we compared flying insects captured using Malaise traps among different vegetation types on a small island (Nishijima; 0.49 km2) in the oceanic Ogasawara (Bonin) Islands in the north-western Paci...

Flower visitors recently decreased in the Ogasawara Islands which are subtropical Pacific oceanic islands located 1,000km south from Japan mainland. The aim of this study was to determine the main cause of this pollinator decline. We assumed four hypothesis, (i) honeybee competition hypothesis, (ii) forest decline hypothesis, (iii) agricultural ins...

We investigated two important life-history traits in parasites, i.e., life cycle and reproductive mode, that should be adapted to specific hosts using the parasitic mite Ensliniella parasitica Vitzthum, 1925 and the host wasp Allodynerus delphinalis (Giraud, 1866) in field- and laboratory-reared nests. The life cycle of E. parasitica was synchroniz...

Phoretic deutonymphs of Sennertia alfkeni and S. japonica, both associated with the Japanese large carpenter bee, Xylocopa appendiculata, were distinguished by Fain (197411. Fain , A. 1974 . The hypopi of the genus Sennertia Oudemans, 1905, described by Oudemans (Acarina, Sarcoptiformes). . Zool Meded. , 48 : 219 – 231 . View all references) by bod...

. 1In the spring, females of the leaf beetle Gonioctena sibirica deposited larvae on the ventral surface of growing young leaves situated on the apical position of shoots of the willow Salix bakko.2The parent females remained with the larvae usually on the underside of the basal part of leaves, facing toward the base of shoots. When other arthropod...

Sphaerularia vespae sp. nov., an endoparasite of a common Japanese hornet, Vespa simillima is described from Hokkaido, Japan, and its molecular sequence profiles are given. This newly discovered nematode appears to belong to the genus Sphaerularia, judging from its characteristic parasitic form, the uterium, which looks like a sausage with many ver...

Bees are important pollinators for many flowering plants. Female bees are thought to be more effective pollinators than male bees because they carry much more pollen than males. Males of some solitary bee species are known to patrol near flowers that females visit. Because patrolling males visit flowers to mate or defend their territories, they may...

We studied the species richness and assemblages of longicorn beetles (Coleoptera, Cerambycidae, Disteniidae) in ten secondary broad-leaved stands and eight plantation stands of Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica) of various ages after clear-cutting or plantation in Ibaraki, central Japan. The species richness of longicorns, which were collected w...

Parasitic nematodes of the genus Sphaerularia are known to infect and sterilize the overwintering gynes (potential queens) of bumblebees.We found that 70% of the overwintered gynes of the hornet Vespa simillima collected using bait traps were infected and sterilized by Sphaerularia sp. This is the first solid record of parasitism by Sphaerularia in...

The results of a biodiversity monitoring program conducted in the Ogawa Forest Reserve and its vicinity, situated in a cool temperate region of Japan, identified three different patterns for species richness. Forests of the region are characterized by a mosaic of secondary deciduous stands of various ages scattered among plantations of conifers. Th...

The structure and feeding group composition of collembolan communities were studied in secondary deciduous forests of different ages to investigate the collembolan community response to environmental changes associated with forest cycles. The study was carried out at eight sites forming a chronosequence (1, 4, 12, 24, 51, 54, 71 and 128 years after...

Two Hibiscus (Malvaceae) species coexist on the oceanic Bonin (Ogasawara) Islands: Hibiscus glaber (an endemic species) and H. tiliaceus (the ancestral non-endemic species). Hibiscus tiliaceus produces extrafloral nectar from the sepals, while H. glaber does not. To clarify the effects of extrafloral nectar loss on Hibiscus-insect relationships, we...

We examined structures of acarinaria and phoretic mite faunas of the large carpenter bees Xylocopa amamensis, X. flavifrons, X. albinotum, and X. ogasawarensis from Japan, and compared them with those of X. tranquebarorum and X. ruficeps from Taiwan. While the first three Japanese Xylocopa bees had acarinaria both on the mesosoma and on the first m...

The adult eumenid wasp, Allodynerus delphinalis delphinalis (Giraud), had obvious acarinaria (mite chambers) on the propodeum, the second metasomal tergite, and the scutellum, harboring deutonymphs of the mite Ensliniella parasitica Vitzthum. The scutellar acarinaria, first described here in detail, were a pair of deeply invaginated chambers situat...

The life cycle of Kurosaia jiju, a mite phoretic on the mason wasp Anterhynchium flavomarginatum micado, is described based on the results of field observations and artificial rearing of the host. One to two deutonymphs of the mite, on average, disembarked from a female wasp and migrated into a host cell while the host was laying an egg or provisio...

This study aims to infer the proportion of queens and workers of the hornet Vespa analis parasitized by the strepsipterous parasite Xenos moutoni in overwintered females from morphological data collected for three years. It is known that both worker and queen hornets parasitized by strepsipterous insects overwinter. The parasitized queens cannot re...

Both females and males of the Japanese large carpenter bee Xylocopa appendiculata circumvolans Smith had a pair of mesosomal acarinaria behind the wing bases as well as the metasomal one in the first tergum. The opening to the mesosomal acarinarium was larger in male bees than in females. The metasomal acarinarium was a narrow and shallow groove ra...

The oviposition season and developmental time of Sipalinus gigas were investigated by periodic setting and collection of cut pine bolts at different times in a Pinus densiflora stand in central Kyushu. The number of S. gigas colonized in the bolts was estimated as the sum of the number of holes that were 3 mm or larger in dia. without scolytids and...

InRopalidia plebeiana, combs made in the previous year are often reused by foundresses in the following spring and structurally divided into subnests by them. Close observations of the comb dividing process revealed that: 1) combs that had multiple brood areas (areas where cells had eggs) were frequently divided into subnests, while those with sing...

Without Abstract

Intraspecific nest usurpation by foundresses was studied in 2 haplometrotic (solitary founding) species of different subgenera,Polistes (P.) riparius andP. (Polistella) snelleni, in areas where they cohabited. The overall probability for a nest to be usurped by a foreign foundress during the season was about twice as large inP. snelleni as inP. rip...

In a population of the haplometrotic paper waspPolistes riparius, a nest is sometimes usurped by a foundress who has lost its nest before worker emergence. Probability of a nest's being usurped during the pre-emergence stage was 0.11–0.23. Foundresses who did not yet have workers rarely rebuilt destroyed nests, while those with workers frequently d...

Without Abstract

Summary 1. Losses in workers and reproductives due to the ichneumonid parasitoidLatibulus sp. were determined in a haplometrotic, temperate paper wasp,Polistes riparius, during a 5-year study. 2. Fifty-four to 79% of pre-emergence nests were parasitized on worker brood, resulting in a worker loss of 25–31% on average. Worker brood reared in...

Dans une population de la guêpe monogyne,Polistes riparius, le nid est parfois usurpé par une fondatrice étrangère dont le nid a été détruit avant l'apparition des ouvrières. La probabilité de l'usurpation est 0.11–0.23 en phase de pré-émergence. La fondatrice qui n'a pas encore d'ouvrières reconstruit rarement le nid détruit, tandis que celle qui...

Dispersion capabilities of new queens were studied in the two haplometrotic paper waspsPolistes riparius andP. snelleni. New queens were marked on the nests in the late summer and located in the next spring. Dispersion distances greatly varied among queens: although a large part of recovered queens nested in close proximity to their natal sites, so...

Taxonomy, life history, nest architecture, and nesting habits of Vespa simillima Smith are given. It is one of the most common vespines in Japan and a nuisance pest in residential and urban areas. The species consists of two subspecies, V. s. simillima Smith and V. s. xanthoptera Cameron. In Hokkaido, northern Japan, V. s. simillima colonies last f...