279) Vespa velutina Lepeletier, 1836

Vespa velutina Lepeletier, 1836: 507 . Type data: Female, MNHN. Type locality: Java, Indonesia.

Vespa auraria Smith, 1852a: 46 .

Vespa crabro var. immaculata Morawitz, 1889: 161 .

Vespa fruhstorferi Stadelmann, 1894: 89 .

Vespa velutina var. ardens du Buysson, 1905 (1904): 550.

Vespa auraria var. nigrithorax du Buysson, 1905 (1904): 553.

Vespa velutina var. Celebensis Pérez, 1910: 12.

Vespa velutina var. megei Pérez, 1910: 13

Vespa mongolica var. divergens Pérez, 1910: 16 .

Vespa flavitarsus Sonan, 1929: 137 & 142.

Vespa velutina sumbana van der Vecht, 1957: 34 & 40.

Vespa velutina variana van der Vecht, 1957: 35 & 37.

Vespa velutina karnyi van der Vecht, 1957: 35 & 38.

Vespa velutina timorensis van der Vecht, 1957: 35 & 40.

Vespa velutina floresiana van der Vecht, 1957: 35 & 40.

Vespa velutina pruthii van der Vecht, 1959c: 228 .

Material examined. INDIA: Himachal Pradesh: Dalhousie, 25.ix.2014, 1 ♀, Coll. Ramesh. Uttarakhand: Bhimtal, 12.xi.2016, 1 ♀, Coll. Ankita Gupta.

Distribution. India: Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Meghalaya, Sikkim, Uttarakhand, West Bengal. Elsewhere: Afghanistan; Bhutan; China (including Taiwan); Indonesia; Laos; Malaysia; Myanmar; Pakistan; South Korea [introduced]; Thailand; Vietnam. (van der Vecht 1959c, Das & Gupta 1984, Archer 1989, Das & Gupta 1989, Jonathan et al. 1996, Jonathan et al. 1996, Carpenter & Kojima 1997, Jonathan et al. 2000a, Jonathan & Kundu 2003, Kundu et al. 2006, Nguyen et al. 2006b, Barthélémy et al. 2014, Choi & Kwon 2015, Girish Kumar et al. 2015c, Pham & Li 2015, Dorji et al. 2017a, Dorji et al. 2017b, Rafi et al. 2017).