Apanteles artemis Slater-Baker, Fagan-Jeffries, Fernández-Triana, Portmann & Oestmann, 2025

Slater-Baker, Mollie-Rosae, Fagan-Jeffries, Erinn P., Oestmann, Katherine J., Portmann, Olivia G., Bament, Tiahni M., Howe, Andy G., Guzik, Michelle T., Bradford, Tessa M., McClelland, Alana R., Woodward, Alice, Clarke, Sylvia, Ducker, Nathan & Fernández-Triana, José, 2025, DNA barcoding, integrative taxonomy, citizen science, and Bush Blitz surveys combine to reveal 34 new species of Apanteles (Hymenoptera, Braconidae, Microgastrinae) in Australia, ZooKeys 1227, pp. 1-128 : 1-128

Apanteles artemis Slater-Baker, Fagan-Jeffries, Fernández-Triana, Portmann & Oestmann sp. nov.

Fig. 4 C ( distribution), Fig. 22 (holotype )

Type material.

Holotype. Australia • ♀; NT, Gregory NP, 5.7 km N Humbert Junction ; - 16.0622, 130.451; 6–12 Jun. 2001; ME Irwin, FD Parker, C Lambkin leg.; Malaise in dry creek bed; BOLD Process ID: AUMIC 479-18 ; ANIC 32-130236 .

Diagnostic description.

Size: Total body length: 2.5 mm; fore wing length: 3.3 mm. Head: anterior scape colour much paler, dramatically different colour than head; F 2 L / W ratio: 2.4; F 14 L / W ratio: 1.5., scutoscutellar sulcus with 11 pits; mesoscutellar disc punctate throughout; propodeal areola complete, or mostly so; propodeum mostly smooth posteriorly, mostly rugose anteriorly; coxae colour (pro, meso, meta): dark all; metafemur colour mostly pale; metafemur colour uniformly pale (a very light brown / orange in the holotype). Wings: centre of pterostigma pigmented to same degree as the outer edges; fore wing r vein length / 2 RS vein length ratio: 1.7. Metasoma: T 1 shape mostly parallel, then narrowing in distal 1 / 3., T 1 medial length / anterior width between 1–2 × longer than wide; T 1 mostly rugose in distal 1 / 2, mostly in smooth basal 1 / 2; T 2 mostly smooth; hypopygium without defined ventral pleats; ovipositor sheath length / metatibia length ratio: 0.3.

Apanteles artemis can be separated from other species of Apanteles in Australia that have the metacoxa dark and the metafemur uniformly pale by the ovipositor sheaths short (<0.5 × metatibia length), the hypopygium without defined ventral pleats, T 1 narrowing and T 2 as in Fig. 22 B . It is also one of the few species with the scape considerably paler than the head colour in when viewed from the anterior of the head.

Due to this species potentially being identified as Parapanteles , we also diagnose it against the three species of Parapanteles known from Australia. Apanteles artemis can be separated from all three species by having the metafemur pale (all Parapanteles known in Australia have the metafemur dark) and by having T 1 more strongly narrowing posteriorly (all Parapanteles known in Australia have a relatively parallel T 1).

Etymology.

This species is named for Artemis, an Olympian goddess from Greek mythology.

Distribution.

Apanteles artemis is currently only known from one specimen from Gregory National Park in the NT.

Molecular information.

Apanteles artemis is currently represented by sequences in BIN BOLD: ADL 5654. The COI sequences are at least 8 % divergent from any of the other species treated here, or any available sequence on BOLD. The wg sequence of the holotype is ≥ 15 bp different to any other species. All molecular species delimitation methods separated Apanteles artemis as a distinct species. The phylogenetic position of the species is unresolved, falling outside the main Apanteles clade in the concatenated analysis of COI and wg of Australian species (Fig. 2 ) and in the COI phylogeny of global Apanteles (Fig. 3 ). Based on the molecular data, Apanteles artemis is closely related to a delimited species from South Australia ( Apanteles sp. MRSB 03) which was not described because no female specimens were available.

Remarks.

This species is potentially better placed in Parapanteles because of the short ovipositor sheaths and the comparatively solid hypopygium without ventral pleats. However, Parapanteles is currently poorly defined and until a more conclusive revision of the genus is completed, we feel it is more useful to place A. artemis in Apanteles because of the molecular data clustering it with morphologically ‘ true’ Apanteles . We note, however, that this species would be an ideal candidate to include in phylogenomic studies of microgastrine genera limits as it may well belong in a different genus.

Figures

Figure 2. IQ-TREE extended majority rule consensus tree of the COI + wg concatenated alignment from Dataset 1 (Australian Apanteles specimens, sequences sharing a BIN with Australian material, and other species reported to occur in Australia). Ultrafast bootstrap support is shown on nodes where support was < 95, nodes where support was 95–99 are represented by an asterisk. Nodes without bootstrap support shown had support of 100. Outgroups, and unnamed species delimited by the molecular consensus but not described, are in grey. The tree is rooted with Microplitis demolitor but cropped for clearer visualisation.

Figure 3. IQ-TREE extended majority rule consensus tree of the COI DNA barcoding region for global Apanteles. Australian specimens are shown in pink. Numbers next to species correlate to the ‘ informal lineage’ code given in Table 1. The full tree in newick format is available as Suppl. material 5. Group A includes informal lineages 36, 37, 40, 41, 42, 43, 45; whilst group B includes informal lineages 1, 9, 10, 11, 15, 18, 20–32, 34, 46.

Figure 4. Known distribution of the Apanteles species in Australia A A. adustus, A. aeternus, A. allapsus, A. amicalis, A. apricus B A. alatomicans, A. apollo, A. aurantius, A. auroralis, A. banrock C A. artemis, A. breviflagellarius, A. brockhedgesi, A. ethanbeaveri, A. fenestrinus, A. ferripulvis, A. hades, and A. insulanus. Maps include examined material and public DNA barcode records, see Suppl. material 3 for full details.

Figure 22. Apanteles artemis (holotype AUMIC 479-18) A lateral habitus B dorsal propodeum and T 1 – 2 C dorsal head D anterior head E fore and hind wing F dorsal habitus.