''Astata'' is a
cosmopolitan
Cosmopolitan may refer to:
Food and drink
* Cosmopolitan (cocktail), also known as a "Cosmo"
History
* Rootless cosmopolitan, a Soviet derogatory epithet during Joseph Stalin's anti-Semitic campaign of 1949–1953
Hotels and resorts
* Cosmopoli ...
genus
Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...
of solitary predatory
wasp
A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder. ...
s in the subfamily
Astatinae
Astatinae are a cosmopolitan group of solitary wasps, peculiar for their males having very large compound eye
A compound eye is a visual organ found in arthropods such as insects and crustaceans. It may consist of thousands of ommatidia, whi ...
. They are known to prey on adults and nymphs of
Pentatomidae
Pentatomidae is a family of insects belonging to the order Hemiptera, generally called shield bugs or stink bugs. Pentatomidae is the largest family in the superfamily Pentatomoidea, and contains around 900 genera and over 4700 species.Robert ...
.
''Astata'' is the largest genus in this subfamily, and is identified by features of its wing venation. The males of this genus and the related genus ''
Dryudella
''Dryudella'' is a genus of wasps in the family Crabronidae
The Crabronidae are a large paraphyletic group (nominally a family) of wasps, including nearly all of the species formerly comprising the now-defunct superfamily Sphecoidea. It col ...
'' have very large
compound eye
A compound eye is a visual organ found in arthropods such as insects and crustaceans. It may consist of thousands of ommatidia, which are tiny independent photoreception units that consist of a cornea, lens, and photoreceptor cells which disti ...
s that broadly meet at the top of the head.
There are 94 species and subspecies of ''Astata'' worldwide, a few of which are listed here:
*''
Astata affinis''
*''
Astata apostata''
Mercet, 1910
*''
Astata bicolor''
*''
Astata boops
''Astata boops'' is a Palearctic
The Palearctic or Palaearctic is the largest of the eight biogeographic realms of the Earth. It stretches across all of Eurasia north of the foothills of the Himalayas, and North Africa.
The realm consists ...
''
(Schrank, 1781)
*''
Astata brevitarsus''
Puławski, 1958
*''
Astata costae''
A. Costa, 1867
*''
Astata diversipes''
Puławski, 1955
*''
Astata gallica''
de Beaumont, 1942
*''
Astata graeca''
de Beaumont, 1965
*''
Astata leuthstromi''
*''
Astata minor''
Kohl, 1885
*''
Astata occidentalis''
*''
Astata quettae''
Nurse, 1903
*''
Astata rufipes''
Mocsáry, 1883
*''
Astata unicolor''
References
External links
Genus ''Astata''Wasp Preys Upon Stink BugNature Search: ''Astata''
Crabronidae
Apoidea genera
Biological pest control wasps
Cosmopolitan arthropods
Hymenoptera of Asia
{{Apoidea-stub