Melitta (Cilissa) californica Viereck, 1909

Pedro, Diego De, Ceccarelli, Fadia Sara, Sagot, Philippe, López-Reyes, Eulogio, Mullins, Jessica L., Mérida-Rivas, Jorge A., Falcon-Brindis, Armando, Griswold, Terry, Ascher, John S., Gardner, Joel, Ayala, Ricardo, Vides-Borrell, Eric & Vandame, Rémy, 2024, Revealing the Baja California Peninsula’s Hidden Treasures: An Annotated checklist of the native bees (Hymenoptera: Apoidea: Anthophila), Zootaxa 5522 (1), pp. 1-391 : 379

Melitta (Cilissa) californica Viereck, 1909

[ Holotype: CASC; ♀ Santa Margarita Island , Baja California Sur, Mexico; March]

Melitta californica occurs in the southwestern USA and northwestern Mexico and specializes on pollen from Sphaeralcea A. St. -Hil. ( Fowler 2020). Within the BCP, it was recorded in the Lower Colorado Desert in March 1963, and March 1964 by AMNH. We reviewed one male collected in the Central Desert in April 2008 ( MABC). The CARCIB team collected one female in the Vizcaíno Desert in October 2016. Additionally, the BBPT collected this species in the Central Desert in February 2020 (2 ♂). Voucher specimens are in MABC, and ECOAB. See fig. 273 .