Scutellista caerulea (Fonscolombe, 1832)

Thorpe, Stephen E., 2013, Scutellistacaerulea (Fonscolombe, 1832) (Hymenoptera: Pteromalidae), new to New Zealand for the second time!, Biodiversity Data Journal 1, pp. 959-959 : 959

Rank: SpeciesType of treatment: Redescription or species observationextantHabitat: terrestrialRoot classification: 8

Scutellista caerulea (Fonscolombe, 1832)

Scutellista cyanea Motschulsky, 1859

Materials

Type status: Other material Occurrence: recordedBy: Stephen Thorpe; individualCount: 1; sex: female; Location: country: New Zealand; verbatimLocality: Tamaki Campus of University of Auckland; verbatimLatitude: 36.8816119078S; verbatimLongitude: 174.8531936109E; Event: eventDate: 17 April 2013; Record Level: institutionCode: Auckland Museum

Description

The specimen was identified using Bouček (1988), and references listed therein. I recommend that Scutellista caerulea be added to the New Zealand Organisms Register (NZOR) as exotic, present in the wild. It is unclear if the new specimen represents a descendant of the original stock released in Nelson in 1921, or a new incursion from overseas. The balance of evidence favours the latter hypothesis, since Auckland is far from Nelson, and the species has not been seen in N.Z. for nearly a century.