The first author studied Indian bembixes in the collections of the Natural History Museum in Paris and the British Museum (Natural History) in London with the collaboration of S. As is often the case with male Bembixes, they spend part of the day and all of the night in burrows in the sand. The diameter of the pit was 5 to 10 mm wide, depending on the looseness of the sand.
PREY.—The cell of the first nest contained a large, presumably nearly full-grown larva of a wasp, three whole paralyzed flies which had recently been brought near the entrance of the cell, and at the inner end fragments of the skeleton of a number of flies which had been eaten. Each of the other two orientalis had only one convex stylopide between terga 3 and 4 on the right side. At 1201 she started another tunnel a few centimeters above and to the right of the first three.
The burrow of an interrupted nest at Palatupana entered the sloping sand of the hill at an angle of 15° to the horizontal for 14 cm. HABITAT.-The first nest site was in Induruwa Jungle, Gilimale, where antoni nested in flat, rough, rip-. erinsand along the bank of a rocky stream. She returned without loot in 5 minutes, scratched up the entrance and flattened some of the loot pile.
STRUCTURE OF THE NEST. – A single completed nest at Gilimal had a burrow diameter of 10 mm, extending down at an angle of 30° for 39 cm and terminating on a layer of hard clay. NEST PREPARATION AND PREY. – A single tended nest in Gilimale contained a very small wasp larva, even. NEST STRUCTURE.— When moist sand was reached, burrows were usually about 5 mm in diameter, but at and near the entrance in dry sand they could be up to 20 mm wide.
A worm may have killed the wasp larva before feeding on one of the prey. He noted that the burrow of the last nest had a sand plug 2 cm from the front end of the cell. Two species of the Actocetor epihydrid were commonly observed around the entrances to the burrows of the borrei; their larvae may be commensal in the nest.
The descriptions above are of samples from the middle of the color variation range. Bembix lunata is the only Ceylonese and South Indian representative of the small bidentata cross. ETYMOLOGY.-The taxon is named after the late Anton Handlirsch, whose monograph on the world fauna of Bembix (1893) set a high standard for systematic work on the genus.
COCOON. – The cocoon is ovoid with a narrower posterior end, 25 X 10 mm, with solid walls of sand grains spun together with silk.
Bembix budha Handlirsch
A pair of USNM paratypes will be deposited in the National Museum, Colombo, two males and a female in the National Museum of Natural History, Leiden, a pair in the British Museum (Natural History) and a male in the University of Oxford. Museum. Three examples of Antoni from the Colombo Museum have been excluded from the type series due to their poor condition. Wings hyaline; vestment pale, short and suberect on clypeus, denser and erect in front, apex, gena, thorax and base of tergum 1, short, suberect, light brown on succeeding terga, and short, thin, subdecumbent on sternum.
Mandible (Figure 29a) robust, curved in apical third, inner margin with large oblique cutting edge beyond tooth, index 1.9; clypeus 1.95 times as wide as high;. Color: black, lower yellow: mandible except apical third, labrum, clypeus entire, but some specimens with a pair of small black spots at base that may merge medially, distinct except for black stripe above in apical half, usually a spot at apex below first flagellar segment, anterior except for narrow oblique stripe from clypeus to side of antennal insertion and broad, U-shaped mark surrounding anterior ocellus and extending halfway on way to antennae, elongated triangular stripe along outer orbit extending to occiput opposite lateral eye, pronotum except pair of median transverse spots on collar, scutum with broad, U-shaped median mark and lateral stripe, both extend short distance from base of sclerite, median band along scutellum widened laterally, metanotum except narrow at apex, mesopleuron except small spot behind pronotal lobe, metapleuron, propodeal triangle except narrow transverse band anteriorly, propodeum except marginal triangle with black stripe extending down lateral surface, most of coxae and trochanters, most of femora except broad stripe above and narrower below anteriorly, shorter stripes above towards apex and down from base middle and hind, tarsi except small spots on tips of foretarsal segments, broad undulating band on basal half or more of tergum 1, broad band on basal two-thirds or more of 2 including a pair of median .
Bembix borrei Handlirsch
VARIATION.—The foregoing descriptions are typical of specimens in the middle of the range of color variation. Males with palest markings have clypeus pale except very narrow at base, short narrow perpendicular line across antennal cup, five transverse spots anteriorly at anterior ocellus, U and lateral stripes on scutum slightly wider, stripe on apical half of scutellum expanded laterally , stripe on apical two-thirds of metanotum, entire mesepimeron, metapleuron, propodeal inclusion except narrowly at base, lateral propodeal surface except small spot around spiracle, posterior propodeal surface except narrowly adjacent inclusion, black areas on femur and tibia below, entire outer surface of tibia, band of tergum 1 wider, enclosing a pair of round black spots, sternum 2 with a large triangular mark laterally, its apex extending almost to anterolateral corner of sclerite and merging near posterior margin with transverse stripe extending in on tip of process, sterna 3–5 with larger triangular posterolateral spots, decreasing in size on successive segments. Records of Strepsiptera from Sri Lanka in the Collection of the Smithsonian Institution, with descriptions of seven new species (NotulaeStrepsipterologicae-VI).
Three new species of the genus Paraxenos (Strepsiptera) parasitic on Bembix (Hymenoptera: Sphecidae) from Sri Lanka and Australia (Notulae Strepsipterologicae-XVII). Biosystematic studies of Ceylonese Wasp, XV: A monograph of the Alyssoninae, Nyssoninae and Gorytinae (Hymenoptera: . Sphecoidea: Nyssonidae). A generic revision of the fossil wasps of the tribes Stizini and Bembicini with notes and descriptions of new species.
An introduction to the study of the Sphecidae (Hym.) of Java, with a key to the genera. Manuscripts intended for serial publication undergo a thorough review (conducted by their originating museums or Smithsonian offices) and are submitted to the Smithsonian Institution Press on Form SI-36, which must demonstrate approval by the appropriate authority designated by the sponsoring organizational unit. Requests for special treatment - use of colors, folds, bound covers, etc. - request additional approval from the sponsoring authority on the same form.
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