Belesica Waterston, 1929

Rousse, P. & Noort, S. Van, 2014, Belesica madiba and Cremastus tutui (Ichneumonidae: Cremastinae), two entomological gems from South Africa, Zootaxa 3795 (2), pp. 161-173 : 162

Belesica Waterston, 1929

Diagnosis (updated from Townes 1971). Fore wing 4–12mm long; body stout, metasoma depressed to barely compressed, apically truncate; head large with ocelli reduced; frons simple or with a median compressed horn between toruli; ventral margin of clypeus simple or with a median pair of small teeth; mandible long and stout, upper tooth shorter than lower tooth; occipital carina dorsally complete, ventrally joining mandibular base; maxillary and labial palpi short with five and four segments respectively; scutellum broad, convex, without lateral carination; propodeum with carination more or less reduced; fore wing with areolet open or partially closed, if closed then distinctly petiolate, rs-m basal to 2m-cu by 0.5–0.8x rs-m length, and Rs & M strongly basal to apical to cu-a; hind wing with distal abscissa of Cu present or absent; ventral margin of hind femur simple; tergite 1 basally narrow, apically abruptly widened, its ventral edges separated and parallel; glymmae longitudinal and very deep, medially thinly separated; thyridium absent; ovipositor 0.2–0.3x longer than hind tibia. Male: ocelli not enlarged; subgenital plate sometimes strongly produced medially into a finger-like process.

Species richness and distribution. Genus confined to Southern Africa, with only two species known of which one is newly described here.

Genotype. Belesica pictipennis ( Tosquinet, 1896) .