''Parancistrocerus'' is a rather large genus of

potter wasp Potter wasps (or mason wasps), the Eumeninae, are a cosmopolitan wasp group presently treated as a subfamily of Vespidae, but sometimes recognized in the past as a separate family, Eumenidae. Recognition Most eumenine species are black or brown, ...

s whose distribution spans the

Nearctic The Nearctic realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting the Earth's land surface. The Nearctic realm covers most of North America, including Greenland, Central Florida, and the highlands of Mexico. The parts of North America t ...

, eastern

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 of several bioregions: the Euro-Sibe ...

Oriental The Orient is a term for the East in relation to Europe, traditionally comprising anything belonging to the Eastern world. It is the antonym of ''Occident'', the Western World. In English, it is largely a metonym for, and coterminous with, the ...

and

Neotropical The Neotropical realm is one of the eight biogeographic realms constituting Earth's land surface. Physically, it includes the tropical terrestrial ecoregions of the Americas and the entire South American temperate zone. Definition In bioge ...

regions. A pair of medial pits on the anterior face of the

pronotum The prothorax is the foremost of the three segments in the thorax of an insect, and bears the first pair of legs. Its principal sclerites (exoskeletal plates) are the pronotum (dorsal), the prosternum (ventral), and the propleuron (lateral) on ea ...

and the expansion of the tegulae put this genus close to the genus '' Stenodynerus'' and many species of both genera are somewhat difficult to assignate to their respective genus. Their species are notable for having a smooth depression acting as an

acarinarium An acarinarium is a specialized anatomical structure which is evolved to facilitate the retention of mites on the body of an organism, typically a bee or a wasp. The term was introduced by Walter Karl Johann Roepke. Evolution The acarinarium has ...

at the base of the second metasomal tergum and hidden under the first metasomal tergum. This acarinarium serves as shelter for

symbiotic Symbiosis (from Greek , , "living together", from , , "together", and , bíōsis, "living") is any type of a close and long-term biological interaction between two different biological organisms, be it mutualistic, commensalistic, or parasit ...

deutonymphs of mites in the family Winterschmidtiidae. Most of the species bear a transverse carina on the first metasomal tergum and the whole body of many neotropical species have a faint submetallic luster. Parancistrocerus perennis mating

References

Bugguide.net. Genus ''Parancistrocerus''
Biological pest control wasps Potter wasps Hymenoptera genera {{potter-wasp-stub

See also

References