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Hello,

I had the luck to see and photography Strepsiptera Stylopidae males and even to photography males in copula on the abdomen of Andrena bees.

I made a page of this, to be found at :
http://www.duhem....eps.en.php

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You did have a lot of luck indeed!

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Hi Pierre,

A very nice find of this intruiging group of insects!
The species inside the Ancistrocerus is not Stylops melittae, which is confined to Andrena hosts, but rather Pseudoxenos heydenii.

John

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Excellent photographs of a very scarcely seen group of insects - well done indeed!! :D

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Hello,

Thanks for the kind words.

I'll correct the page about the Ancistrocerus' parasit not being a Stylopidae, but rather a Xenidae.

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Hi Pierre,

Well Xenidae, not everybody follows that split of families...
In my papers it is still under Stylopidae.
But those are just details! :D

Best wishes,

John

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great webpage.

For me it is so easy to spot them. :) I have seen thousands male strepsiterans. :S On Larinioides's web! :D Thousands (here)is not a metaphor, it is the truth. :D I always thougth them as very common insect. :)
I have one photo that shows the female strepsiteran on abdomen of a Polistes ( the signal of her... not really her :D)

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I have caught only two specimens in over 1100 days of malaise trapping here in Greece, I would love to know what they are if anybody is able to determine them I will happilly send the specimens to them.

Gordon

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Gordon,

The specialist is Jeyaraney Kathirithamby (in Oxford).
On an Apidae list, she was told to welcome specimen in alcohol (see her page at http://users.ox.a...

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Hi Gordon,

I can identify them as well.

John

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Pierre try to find near bridges on spiders' webs. There is no better place to see them!!! I saw them many times!!! IN one web you can find over 30!!! :o Larinioides are an autentic serial killer!!! :o:o

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I used to see adult males semi-regularly when I still used light to attract moth in my parents garden. Too bad I didn't know then that they are rather rarely collected.

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Hello,

Thanks to all for the kind words. It really makes me happy to spend those hours looking for something to photography in my cemetery. But nevermind.

@Jorge:
Why don't you show some of those pictures? We dipterists are rather open-minded...

@John
Sorry for not mentionning you. I should have done it, since you were mentionned in the list I was speaking about.

@Kahis
We had a thread, on this forum, about a specimen caugth in a Malaise trap, some months (years?) ago. Those "little" orders are always rather funny as a way to relax a little.

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Pierre, I don't have the photos of strepsipteran. But I will take photos, ok?

But for now I will show you a very ancient photo I took to a Polistes with my ancient nikon coolpix.
if you see in right part of abdomen it is possible to see an edema caused by a female strepsiteran.



for BIGGER size
http://www.flickr...5/sizes/l/


I must wait for more warm weather so I can spot them! And then I will take some shots. But remember: they will be dead males on the web...

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My thanks to Pierred for the info, but as I am already sending my Tephritids to John I will simply add the two tubes of Streps to the bag when it goes out.

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I've got several Aculeate specimens with either female Stylops or empty male Styops pupa present, but I have only ever seen one male "in the wild". This was blown onto my car windscreen on a windy day just as I was starting up. Unfortunately, before I could do anything more than stare at it and say "wow - a Stylops" the wind smashed it to bits.

I will be checking out spiders webs near Aculete colonies this year though.......

Matt

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Hi all,

@ Pierre,
No need to say sorry!

@ Gordon,
Thanks for providing the opportunity to study the specimens!
If i understand you well, you are sending all in alcohol, right? That's good! Especially for the Strepsipterans.

@ Jorge,
This really is the first time I heard they can be found in spider webs!! Really looking forward to seeing photo's of it! And if you would be so kind as to put a few of them on alcohol for me, I'ld be greatfull!

The Polistes infesting species as well as the Andrena insfesting ones are quite common, the other species however are rather rare! There are still several Aculeate genera with strepsipteran's which I have never seen before: in Panurgus, Bembix, Bembicinus, Podalonia, Ammophila etc. Has any of you ever seen these?
Another species that is quite common, or at least suspected to be quite common is Halictophagus silwoodensis paraitising in Ulopa reticulata (Homoptera, Cicadellidae), which feeds monophagous on Calluna vulgaris. Here in the Netherlands it should be possible to see the males in april on Calluna. No idea if it can be found outside it's known range, i.e. Belgium, Germany, England and the Netherlands. So go look for it ;). I have recorded this species new for the Netherlands last year, including pictures of females inside the abdomen of the Ulopa and a picture of the Ulopa reticulata, anyone who wants a pdf, just let me know. Could make the searching somewhat easier.

John

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Dear John,
Yes my specimens are all in alcohol, hopefully the mountain traps i am running this year will yield more streps. I hope you will forgive me if not all the Tephritidae are Tephritidae, they will be things that are common in the trap and can be thrown out.

May I ask are you also doing the Ulidiidae for me, and if not can you suggest someone who can?

Gordon

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Hi Gordon,

No problem1 I am use to getting all kinds of stuff as 'Tephritids'.
I can do nearly all Tephritoidea for you (excluding Lonchaeidae!), so Ulidiidae, Platystomatidae, Pallopteridae (though Jan Willem does these for you I guess) and Tephritidae.

Would be nice if the mountain traps would yield more Strepsiptera!

Best wishes,

John

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Recently Christian Schmid-Egger showed my Strepsipterans in alcohol that he got from Wolfgang Rutkies. Wolfgang made great photo series of copulations, see the pics in the HymIS gallery (http://www.hymis....tree_seq=7). Best wishes, Sundew

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John / Gordon
happy to look at Lonchaeidae - I recently found a new species frrom the Greek Mountains

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I saw a few weeks ago some male Strepsiptera in Belgium and collected one of them.

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Difficult to see on this picture, but it seems to be Stylops melittae.

John

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What would be a better photo for determination? With which characters? Thanks.

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Hi Jorgen,

for one thing higher resolution...
And I need to see the antenna

John

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I hope that this is a better photo. It's difficult to photografh with more detail due tue the size and the cloudy weather.

http://home.scarl...strep2.jpg

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Hi Jorgen,

Yep it's sufficient to confirm Stylops melittae.

John

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ok, John. I will collect strepsiterans for you. I didn't see so far strepsiterans. But it is early yet.

"Panurgus, Bembix, Bembicinus, Podalonia, Ammophila etc. Has any of you ever seen these?"

I only saw Bembix and Ammophila here. But I will take a careful look at their abdomen. :)

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Hi Jorge,

Thanks in advance!

John

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John,

Reading on Fauna europaea, I find (Kinzelbach, R. 1978) synonymized all hitherto known Stylops species from the western Palaearctic region with Stylops melittae (including a complete list of synonyms).

Can you shed some light on this?

Thanks in advance.

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Hi Pierre,

Up till 1978 there were an awful lot of Stylops species described in the (wester) palearctic, but all either based on a male specimen or on female, only a very few on both. Everytime they found a new Andrena species stylopised, they described it as a new species. Ragnar Kinzelbach has examined a lot of material, males as well as females and that the differences overlapped and the females and males were quite inseparable from onanother. Wheras other species, from other hosts like Homoptera and other Aculeate hosts are clearly different. Therefore he synonymized all Stylops species known from Andrena's, I believe only the western Palearctic ones. For I know there is at least one (probably more) other species known from the Nearctic.
I have no idea if anyone has ever compared S. melittae with species outside the palearctic. I am not really into the nomenclature and systematics of Strepsiptera, I have only written a few faunistical papers on the group, and follow Kinzelbach in his opinion, for the arguments and the numerous drawings he gives on the different Stylops 'taxa' are quite convincing to me and therefore I only consider S. melittae in Europe.

Best wishes,

John

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John,

Thanks a lot for taking the time to write this.

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Pierre,

No problem, my pleasure!
We're here to exchange info, are we not?!

John

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Pierre,

No problem, my pleasure!
We're here to exchange info, are we not?!

John

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Pierre,

No problem, my pleasure!
We're here to exchange info, are we not?!

John

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I made a small overview of Belgian Strepsiptera species, including Halictophagus silwoodensis from Maasmechelen. Interested members simply can ask me a copy. In the attachement: The frontal part of Xenos vesparum, several specimens were found in the south of Belgium recently.

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I made a small overview of Belgian Strepsiptera species, including Halictophagus silwoodensis from Maasmechelen. Interested members simply can ask me a copy. In the attachement: The frontal part of Xenos vesparum, several specimens were found in the south of Belgium recently.

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Hi Hans(?)

I presume it is you.

Nice of you to join this forum on other two-winged insects ;)

John

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Stylops melittae, from the garden of Jorgen Ravoet, Zemst.

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Stylops melittae, from the garden of Jorgen Ravoet, Zemst.

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Wonderful pictures!!

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I have taken a photo in finals of AUgust.
It is a very crap photo taken with a compact digital camera.

Usually I saw black strepsiterans caught in the web but this time I've seen a red strepsiteran.

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and another one..

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another crap photo showing the web over a bridge... and a strepsipteran caught in the web. Usually I saw dozens and dozens of them, this time I only saw 1 to 3.. :(

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Hello,

Fine idea. I should definitively look at spider webs around the spots where I saw the Stylopidae.