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Chalcidoidea - Science topic

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I have a question related to a paper I'm working on. I am working on an article on Warren O. Addicott (sort of a very late memorial). Doing a google search for "addicotti" I've across a wasp, Pleistodontes addicotti Wiebes (1991) (Wiebes JT. 1991. Agaonidae (Hymenoptera: Chalcidoidea) and Ficus (Moraceae): fig wasps and their figs, VII (Pleist- odontes). Proceedings of the Koninklijke Nederlandse Akad- emie van Wetenschappen 94: 137–152). I need to check this article to see if this species is named for Warren Addicott, but I cannot find a pdf of the paper. Can anyone help? Thanks.
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Hello Charles,
I have a PDF of the original description: you are right. It is not dedicated to Warren Addicott. Wiebes did not explicitely specify the etymology of the name in the description, however, he states in the introduction he is naming one species after John F. Addicott, and the type material of this species is collected by J. F. Addicott, who is (as far as I know) now professor emeritius at the University of Calgary.
best regards
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The images depict two similar specimens, although they appear somewhat different. Specimen on images 1 to 4 was collected on a yellow trap with glue. It was removed with dipentene (lemonene) and treated with acetone fumes to prevent body collapse. I think this treatment altered the metallic sheen on thorax that is visible on the second specimen. This specimen has its wings removed but they show the same pattern visible on the second specimen. Specimen on images 5 to 7 was collected on a yellow pan trap (Moericke type) and simply dry mounted. We can see that the thorax has bluish-green metallic sheen. Most distinctive is the antennae with an expanded flat scape and very transverse and flat funicle segments. Clava is 3 segmented. The wing pattern of dark spots presents a distinctive one that looks like an "8" on the disk, bellow the stigma.
Can anyone of you with Chalcidoidea experience give me some clue as to the identity of this beautiful species?
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Identity Found!
According to Christer Hansson, a specialist on Eulophidae, the species pictured is Wichmannia pictipennis Boucek, 1972. Originaly described from Tenerife (Canary Islands) parasitizing Scolytinae feeding on dead branches of Euphorbia spp. Posteriorly was referenced also for Madeira Island by Koponen & Askew in 2002. I thank also John Noyes for suggesting to contact C. Hansson.
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I have already started to study the eulophidae family. I have 3 different identification keys for the diglyphus but each of them give me different results. So i am not sure about my identifications.
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Dear Oktay hi
The Chinese key does not contain D. sabulosus Erdoes and also other species like D. poppoea Walker.
You could use this key ( in Russian) but with figures.
You could use key of Hansson (see pdf)
Zoya
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Full reference: Graham, M.W.R. de V. (1991), A reclassification of the European Tetrastichinae (Hymenoptera: Eulophidae): revision of the remaining genera. Memoirs of the American Entomological Institute No 49, 322pp
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You most welcome
Houda
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I think this small Chalcid (body lenght - 0,6 mm) belongs to Aphelinidae (Hymenoptera, Chalcidoidea) family. Antennae include  6 segments. I found it in the litter of pine forest. Could some expert comment my opinion?
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please post some more images to confirm identification
thanks
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I caught several specimen of these wasps on different dry grassland sites in Eastern Germany. I've got really no idea about the function of the extraordinarily shaped petiolus. It looks like a kind of suit-case handle, but I think it's no deformation.
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Hello Sebastian:
There is good information about the biology and behaviour of Platygastridae wasps in the Annual Review of Entomology by Austin et. al 2004.  He mentions about 87 species of Inostemma. Inostemma are solitary koinobionts in cecidomyiid hosts. These taxa oviposit into eggs or newly emerged larvae, but development is delayed until the host larva is almost fully grown. In at least some cases the parasitoid develops preferentially in particular host tissues, such as brain, nerve cord, and gut. Few species are gregarious within their host, and polyembryony has been confirmed for only one species.  For specific taxonomic keys please check the bibliography in this article by Austin et. al. 2004.
Best regards,
Luis Miguel
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We have been struggling to gather more gene fragments data for multiple loci species delimitation for Chalcidoidea, especially the family eulophidae. There has been a tradition to sequence both 28S D2 and COI in the lab. However, the standard primers for COI works at roughly 60% success rate. We also expect to sequence 3-5 more gene fragments for these tiny wasps. We do appreciate if you provide some valuable informations/approaches on more efficient COI primers or other gene primers.
Thanks in advance. 
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My lab is working on a pipeline to take next gen data and produce primers for sequencing across species. It is based on the software found at https://github.com/rachelss/SISRS/tree/feature/SISRS-loci . Currently you can use this software to get conserved loci from ngs data very easily. The consensus of these loci can be used for probes. We are just about to attempt this. Automated primer development is in development but you can take a bunch of alignments and come up with primers manually. Please let me know if this helps. I will probably need to provide update the software to get exactly what you need. I am happy to discuss further.
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Trichomalopsis is a pupal parasitoid of dipterans. Its counterpart Nesolynx thymus parasitizes even upto 100% whereas the Trichomalopsis prefers to sting & kill >80% pupae instead of utilizing them for its progeny production. is there a similar behaviour in any other parasitoids? If so, pl share few references.
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I don't know the answer to this question.  But, you might try looking up papers on "wasteful killing."  A good recent paper is by Trubl et al (2011) "Wasteful killing in urban black widows."   With predators, wasteful killing sometimes means the prey are available in abundance, so the cost of killing is low and there is little selection against being overly aggressive.
For a parasitoid, perhaps most of the pupae are unsuitable as hosts, and killing them selects for greater host suitability in the host population?
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Hey, i am working as a lab-assistant and got a huge pile of samples from the field with Trichogramma species inside. Does anyone know of some published keys to determine Trichogramma to species level (most for all T. evanescens and T. cacociae)?
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John Pinto is the world's expert on Trichogramma systematics, but he is now retired. His publications are listed in his website at: http://www.facultydirectory.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/pub/public_individual.pl?faculty=611 . I am a taxonomist by training, but this is one of the toughest groups out there due to the small size and difficulty separating species.