Aulacus wau Jennings & Austin

Jennings, John T. & Austin, Andrew D., 2006, Aulacid wasps (Hymenoptera: Aulacidae) of New Guinea, with descriptions of five new species, Zootaxa 1365, pp. 19-35 : 27-29

Aulacus wau Jennings & Austin , sp. nov.

( Figs 1 , 10–11)

Material examined. Holotype. ♀, " New Guinea, Wau, 1200 m , 1.XI.1965 " " Malaise Trap, P. Shanahan, BISHOP" ( BPBM ). Right antenna glued to card, left antenna, fore and mid legs missing, some museum beetle damage, particularly to mesosoma and metasoma.

FEMALE. Length. 8.0 mm, excluding ovipositor.

Colour. Orange except head, metasoma, T1, mid and hind tibiae, tarsi, and ovipositor sheaths brown; wings hyaline with a pale brown tint.

Head. 1.4 x wider than long in dorsal view (Fig. 10); face weakly rugulose, scattered short setae; subantennal groove absent; frons without lateral medial carina above toruli, largely smooth, weakly rugulose medially, with short scattered setae; vertex largely smooth, rugulose laterally, with a few very small punctures associated with short setae; gena imbricate-rugulose with scattered short setae; posterior margin of head not concave in dorsal view; occipital carina absent; malar space 0.3 x eye height; clypeus 4.3 x as wide as high, margin sinuate, small truncate medial process; distance from lateral ocellus to eye margin 1.28 x distance between lateral ocelli; scape 1.32 x length pedicel; first flagellomere 1.75 x as long as scape, 0.77 x as long as second flagellomere.

Mesosoma. Propleuron weakly punctulate, pubescence short, ventro-lateral carina present; pronotum without angular process, punctate ventrally, weakly rugose dorsally; mesoscutum in lateral view rounded antero-dorsally, medial and lateral lobes coarsely strigate, with scattered short setae, admedial lines present; scutellum and axilla coarsely strigate; metapostnotum scrobiculate, posterior margin almost straight; mesepisternum smooth dorsally, rugose ventrally, with a few scattered short setae; mesepimeron broad, carinate; metapleuron rugose, with a few scattered short setae; propodeum coarsely rugose, posterior margin smooth, weakly scrobiculate medially; hind coxa rugulose laterally, pubescence very short laterally, ovipositor guide a shallow depression, almost horizontal on lower ventro-medial inner surface of hind coxae (Fig. 11); hind trochanter imbricate, with scattered short setae; hind prefemur present; hind femur imbricate, with scattered short setae; hind tibia imbricate, pubescence short, with scattered stout emergent setae; hind femur 0.73 x length hind tibia; hind tibia with ventro-apical pecten of short robust spines; hind tarsal segments 1–4 with ventro-apical pecten of short robust spines, segment 1, 2.53 x length segment 2; segment 2, 1.9 x length segment 3; segment 3, 1.67 x length segment 4; segment 4, 0.67 x length segment 5; hind tarsal claw simple, 0.56 x length segment 5; fore wing vein 2-Rs+M long, second discal cell narrow, vein 2r-m absent except for small stub where it joins veins 2-M and 3-Ma, vein 3r-m largely spectral; hind wing venation complete, R+Rs, M+Cu, Cu, r-m and 2-M present but spectral and indistinct, with 2 hamuli.

Metasoma. 1.56 x length of mesosoma; T1 and T2 narrow when viewed dorsally, glabrous; ovipositor 12.0 mm.

MALE. Unknown

Remarks. Aulacus wau differs from both A. sedlaceki and A. enaratodi in that the ovipositor guide on the hind coxae is represented by a shallow depression on the lower ventro-medial inner surface of the hind coxae, almost horizontal with the lower margin in lateral view (Fig. 11). This is quite different from Australian aulacids examined to date ( Jennings et al. 2004a, b) and those from New Caledonian ( Jennings et al. 2004c), all of which have a distinct, generally more or less vertical ovipositor guide.

This species also differs from the other New Guinean species in several other character states including the larger body size and orange colouration. It is named after the type locality, Wau , Papua New Guinea ( Fig. 1 ). The host biology of this species is unknown.

Figures

FIGURE 1. Distribution of Aulacus and Pristaulacus species in New Guinea. ˖ = A. enaratodi;