Hoplitis (Stenosmia) flavicornis ( Morawitz, 1877 )

Müller, Andreas, 2014, Palaearctic Hoplitis bees of the subgenus Stenosmia (Megachilidae, Osmiini): biology, taxonomy and key to species, Zootaxa 3765 (4), pp. 301-316 : 310

Hoplitis (Stenosmia) flavicornis ( Morawitz, 1877)

Osmia flavicornis Morawitz, 1877: 47 .

Type material: Lectotype ♂, by designation of Warncke (1991), “Etschmiadsin” ( Armenia), Russian Academy of Sciences St. Petersburg.

New records. ARMENIA: Armavir province, 4km NE Nalbandyan, 900m, 14.6.2004 (leg. O. Berg). TURKMENISTAN: Tzarschanga, 45km NE Karlyuk, 6.5.1993 (leg. M. and J. Halada); Kugitang-Gebirge, Karlyuk, 6.5.1995 (leg. K. Schönitzer).

Distribution. Armenia eastwards to the Central Asian desert. Since H. flavicornis has often been confounded with other H. ( Stenosmia ) species, its distribution range is poorly known.

Pollen hosts. Possibly oligolectic on Peganum (Nitrariaceae) : all 11 pollen loads (2 localities, 2 countries) analyzed so far consisted of Peganum pollen (probably P. harmala ), which is in line with Morawitz (1877), who observed this species on Peganum flowers in Armenia.

Nesting biology. Unknown.

Notes. Osmia flavicornis in the key of Warncke (1991b) is Hoplitis desertorum spec. nov.. The observations on nesting and host plants reported by Marikovskaya (1968) for Osmia flavicornis probably refer to Hoplitis crassipunctata spec. nov.. Stenosmia sp. aff. aravensis in Praz et al. (2008) is in fact H. flavicornis .