Short Communication |
Corresponding author: Ralph S. Peters ( r.peters@zfmk.de ) Academic editor: Toshko Ljubomirov
© 2024 Tobias Salden, Björn Müller, George Japoshvili, Nils Hein, Ani Ugrelidze, Ralph S. Peters.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Citation:
Salden T, Müller B, Japoshvili G, Hein N, Ugrelidze A, Peters RS (2024) First records of the Hymenoptera superfamilies and families Mymarommatoidea: Mymarommatidae and Stephanoidea: Stephanidae in Georgia. Caucasiana 3: 145-150. https://doi.org/10.3897/caucasiana.3.e124925
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We record for the first time the families Stephanidae and Mymarommatidae and the corresponding superfamilies Stephanoidea and Mymarommatoidea in Georgia. A single female of Stephanus serrator (Fabricius, 1798) was collected in Kakheti, Lagodekhi Protected Area (LPA), in the east, and five individuals of Mymaromma anomalum (Blood & Kryger, 1922) were collected in Achara, Kintrishi National Park (KNP), in the west of Georgia. Each of the studied wasp species is complemented by DNA (CO1) barcode sequences. Vouchers are deposited at Museum Koenig Bonn (LIB, ZFMK) and the Entomology Collection of the Agricultural University of Georgia (ECAUG).
Caucasus, CO1 barcode, new record, parasitoid wasps
The hymenoptera fauna of Georgia is still largely unknown. Recent progress has added numerous taxa to the list (
Stephanidae
Leach, 1815, is a species-poor family with around 360 described extant species worldwide (
Mymarommatidae
Debauche, 1948 is also rarely collected, even more species-poor family (with 19 described extant species), though having worldwide distribution (
Morphological examinations of the specimens were carried out with a Leica M205C stereomicroscope with a Leica Planapo 1.0x, M-series (WD 61.5mm) objective, and Leica PI 10x/23 oculars, also with a Zeiss stemi508 stereomicroscope, and the image of M. anomalum was taken with a Zeiss Axiocam 208.
DNA extraction and COI barcode amplification were performed in the LIB (ZFMK) molecular laboratory following the protocol described in
Identification of S. serrator is straightforward. The species is very distinctive and the only species known of the genus from the Western Palaearctic (van
The third author identified the individuals of M. anomalum (Blood & Kryger, 1922) four of them are deposited in the Entomology Collection of the Agricultural University of Georgia (ECAUG) and one in the Museum Koenig Bonn (LIB, ZFMK). The comparison of the DNA barcode region fragment generated herein to the BOLD database did not result in an unambiguous species identity (accessed on 18.03.2024).
Family Stephanidae Leach, 1815
Genus Stephanus Jurine, 1807
Stephanus serrator (Fabricius, 1798)
Materials examined. GEORGIA • 1 female; Lagodekhi Protected Area (LPA), Kakheti; 41°48.55’N, 46°19.34’E; 500 m a.s.l.; 30. May. 2022; leg. T Salden; sweep net; ZFMK-Hym-00040197 (BOLD Process ID: GBHYG4494-24).
Genus Mymaromma Girault, 1920
Mymaromma anomalum (Blood & Kryger, 1922)
Marterials examined. GEORGIA • 1 female; Kintrishi National Park (KNP), Ajara; 41°44.23’N, 41°58.75’E; 404 m a.s.l.; 27. July - 10. August. 2018, leg. CaBOL team; Malaise trap; HYM1000200. • 3 females; Kintrishi National Park (KNP), Ajara; 41°44.23’N, 41°58.75’E; 404 m a.s.l.; 10-24. August. 2018; leg. CaBOL team; Malaise trap; HYM1000198, HYM1000199, ZFMK-HYM-00040198 (BOLD Process ID: GEMYM001-24). • 1 female; Kintrishi National Park (KNP), Ajara; 41°43.77’N, 42°4.65’E; 1020 m a.s.l.; 10-24. August. 2018; leg. CaBOL team; Malaise trap; HYM1000201.
Both species serve as notable new records for the Georgian fauna, as they represent new records of families and superfamilies and therefore complement our knowledge of the Georgian wasp fauna on a high taxonomic level. We hope that this will contribute to the generation of additional distribution data for these two spectacular, yet often overlooked or neglected, parasitoid wasp taxa from Georgia and other countries.
We thank Jana Thormann for uploading sequences to BOLD. We also thank Sopio Injia for preparing the image of M. anomalum.
The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
No ethical statement was reported.
BMBF-funded project Caucasus Barcode of Life (CaBOL - https://ggbc.eu/), grant number: 01DK20014A provided financial support of the field work.
TS wrote the manuscript with support from RSP, and collected and identified provided specimens. BM conducted the DNA barcoding. GJ and AU collected and identified provided specimens. GJ contributed to the writing of the manuscript. NH planned and organized the collecting event.
Tobias Salden https://orcid.org/0009-0002-7993-8896
Björn Müller https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6233-5410
George Japoshvili https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9901-4554
Nils Hein https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5172-8531
Ani Ugrelidze https://orcid.org/0009-0006-3630-506X
Ralph S Peters https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7784-9203
All of the data that support the findings of this study are available in the main text or Supplementary Information.