The Wharton Lab

Physotarsus albus Zhaurova, 2009: 12-13. Holotype male in AEIC.

Lateral ocelli separated by about 0.5X their widest diameter from each other and about 2.0X their widest diameter from eye margin. Antennae with 24-26 flagellomeres. Pronotum and mesoscutum impunctate, shiny. T1 3.0X as long as broad. Face white; frons and occiput orange. Mesosoma orange, area around propodeal spiracles sometimes brown. Metasomal tergites brown with narrow, white lateral and apical margins, sternites white. Hind leg almost entirely dark brown to black. Fore wing very lightly and evenly infumate, nearly hyaline.

Physotarsus albus is readily recognized by the uniformly lightly colored wing and contrastingly white face and clypeus on an orange head. No other species has the same color pattern on the fore wing. Physotarsus leucohypopygus Zhaurova, similar in size and body sculpture, also know only from Brazil, has a uniformly colored head and hyaline wings with fuscous spot at apex. The wing of P. flavipennis Zhaurova is somewhat similar, but with a dark apical spot and P. flavipennis is distinctly punctate on the face, frons, and mesopleuron.

Known only from southwestern Brazil.

Unknown.

Material Examined. Holotype male (AEIC, Type No. 3847): [BRAZIL, Sao Paulo] first line of data label: “Serra da Bocaina” second line: “1600m. S. J. Barreiros” third line: “XI. 4–7. 1967 Brazil” fourth line: “Alvarenga & Seabra”. Paratypes: 1 male, same data as holotype (AEIC); 8 males, same data except 1650m, xi.1968 (AEIC, TAMU).

This page was assembled by Bob Wharton and Kira Zhaurova, and is part of a revision of the genus Physotarsus (Zhaurova and Wharton 2009). Material examined for this revision was borrowed from the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, the American Entomological Institute, Gainesville (AEIC), The Natural History Museum, London, the U. S. National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D. C., and INBio, Costa Rica. We are particularly grateful to David Wahl for the extended loan of the specimens listed above., as well as to Matt Yoder for the electronic interface and to Heather Cummins and Mika Cameron for assistance with literature and figures. We would also like to acknowledge the kind assistance of Ian Gauld, David Wahl, Andrew Bennett, and Gavin Broad for information exchange about ichneumonids during the course of this work. Our use of PURLs (http://purl.oclc.org) for the web interface follows the example of their use in publications by Norm Johnson. The work was conducted at Texas A&M University and supported by NSF/PEET grant no. DEB 0328922 and associated REU supplement # 0723663. Page last updated October 2010.

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant Number DEB 0328922 with REU supplement DEB 0723663.
Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.