A PRELIMINARY LIST OF THE SPHECINAE OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
Hymenoptera, G Spencer, W \velli Ngton
1948
unpublished
With the idea o f rl'ctJrding for this Province, at least a fe w of th e enormous number o f species o f Hym en opt era with which we are blessed, we present a first list c f 3 tribes of di gger or thread-waisted wasps, called also mud daubers. Th e solitary or agg regated mud nests o f some spec ies, resembling heavy tubes, arc not uncommon under eav eS of barns; others huild nests in the ground. All of them provision their nests with other insects such as caterpillars (Iarge lv cutworms),
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... -grown nymphs of g rasshoppe rs, or spide rs. The steel-blue Chlorion, or C !JtI-i ybion , or blue or black P or/fli ouia are comm on sights on th l' ran ges of the interior of th e Provin ce as th ey ncrl'()usly, with short rushes, hunt th eir prey. Th e seni or author once took 39 paralyzed spiders from the nest of, [ think, Scdiphroil caementariuJIl Dr. Th ese mud n ests readily disintegrate if they' become rain-soaked , hence the care with which th e mother insect places them in dr\', sheltered places. The best co llect in g g rounds for th ese sph ecoids is a patch of umbclliferous p1a;1ts ill full flow er, such as water parsnip , which they fn:yul' nt in la rge numbers. Th e giant of this g roup, Ch/orion iclllll'lI-l1Ionium Linn. is VLTV partial to flowering hea ds of milkweed. The 210 specin1L'lls UP()ll which this paper is based are th e gn'a ter part of these insects occ llrring in th e Un i versi ty collections. Most of them were coll ected hI' G. J. Spencer who has wr itten the sc ript of this paper; the tas k of listin g th e species and a rrang in g th e nam es was don e by \V. G. W ellin gton. Cordial thanks a re offered by Dr. D on :\lllrra\', University o f Minnesota, for identi fring th esL' wasps. Tribe CHLOR[ONINI Chlorion atratUl7l L eP " lcti er, Kamloops, Summerland. Chlorion bifoveoilltulil Taschenberg, Lyt-ton, K a mloops, Summerland. Ch/orirJ1/ azteclIlII Saussure, Summerland. Chi orion laevivcntris (Cresson), L ytton, Win slow. ChLorion icimell IJu'millJII Linn ae lls, Salmon Arm, Vernoll, Kamioops, Sum-m er land , P enticton. Tribe SPHECINI Por/airmia (PS(lJ1I m ophila) luctltosa Smith, Vernon, Summerland, Kam1oops, Chii-cotin. P or/aio llia (P salllJII .) ·valida Cresson, Nic-cia, ChiJcotin. P o,iaionia (P samJII.) }'obusta Cresson, L ytton, Summerland. Podalonia (P sa1l/.17l.) COllllllltnis Cresson, Vanco uve r, K ve Ba\', Sooke, Com ox, !V1.t. T olmi e, ' De pa~ture Ba y, New-castl e I s.
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