ARNOLDS. MENKE, Editor Terry Nulln, Editorial Assistant Sjlslomalic Entomology I.Bbratory Aaricultural Research Service, USDA c/o llational Musaum of Natural History Smnhonian Institution, Washi~ton. DC 20560 APRIL 1989 (202) 382·1803 A FORUM FOR ACULEATE WASP RESEARCHERS SPHECOS EDITORIAL FRASS acknowledge the help of Britt Griswold. Back Issues of Sphecos He gave us initial training in the Not to be outdone by the spnly looks Macintosh and helped get us started We have stockpiles of most of the of our sister newsletter Melissa with Sphecos 18. past issues of Sphecos, and we edited by Ron McGinley and Charles Esthetics aside, there are two would like to reduce the quantities. Michener, we have accepted the serious reasons for adopting the new Several issues are completely gone (3, challenge and entered the world of three column format. The mailing list 7, 13) and several others are in short Macintosh with this issue of for Sphecos is becoming gargantuan supply (1, 2,11, 12, 14,17), but we have Sphecos. Could this be the (572 people - larger than some plenty of the remainder. If you Jack any beginning of Newsletter Wars? Using a journals!), and mailing costs for an back issues send us a Jetter listing Macintosh II, Ready Set Go! (a issue of nearly 50 pages in the old those you would like to have and we'll desktop publishing program) and a format were becoming horrendous. For mail them off to you. scanning system, we have embarked example it cost nearly 4 dollars to on an entirely new look for Sphecos. airmail a single copy of the last issue The scanning system, for those of overseas! Hyou mu~iply that by 250, you who may be unfamiliar with this the approximate number of foreign technology, involves a machine that recipients, the mailing cost ls scans (or reads) typed copy, or staggering without including all of the drawings, into the computer system, North American mailings that cost in allowing them to be inserted directly the neighborhood of 1 dollar each. RESEARCH NEWS into the document being produced. Because of the ever tightening US Kalle Previously we retyped your ms. into the government budgets, the Systematic Remm (Institute of Zoology computer, which was quite time Entomology Laboratory simply cannot and Botany, Vanemuise 21, Tartu, consuming. By scanning your material, afford this kind of expense any longer. Estonia, 202400 USSR) is interested in much typing time is saved, although By using a 3 column format and a the faunistics of Estonian wasps, and is the system isn't perfect and many smaller type font, Sphecos can be currently working on Sphecoidea. errors must be corrected. Figures reduced in size considerably. The scanned into the computer can be considerable weight saving due to Lloyd Elghme (Pacific Union cleaned up or modnied on screen. The fewer pages will reduce mailing costs. College, Angwin, Calif. 94508-9797) scanning system only works well on And an issue of fewer pages means reports: "The Diodontus revision is text material submitted in type written that it will be possible to have sufficient finally published. This has been a form. So if you would like your future copies reproduced to cover our mailing fascinating and frustrating experience. articles scanned into Sphecos, needs. Something, like writing a please use a typewriter for the copy, or Even so the cost of airmailing book. As one if computer generated, printed in letter Sphecos overseas may be deemed author so aptly stated, 'Writing a book is quality mode with words spaced well prohibitive by the leadership of SEL like having a baby, easy to start but apart. Some draft mode printing cannot and the day may come when the difficult to finish.' The same could be be scanned. newsletter will have to be sent surface said about doing a generic revision. Terry Nuhn is rapidly becoming an mail. That may resu~ in a delay of 6 or One of the great frustrations has been expert on the Macintosh and he is even 8 weeks between mailing and that of not having sufficient time to responsible for putting this entire issue receiving Sphecos by some readers. devote to research. My life as a in the computer. We must I hope that that day never comes. teaching professor in a small college 2 SPHECOS18 has been very rewarding but I have Chris Starr (Dept. of Horticulture, reference to the Western Himalayan never been able to devote the time to Univ. of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602) Region." research that I would like. Now, after 35 says: "My revision of Parischnogaster, years of classroom teaching, both my the largest and best studied of the six J_C. Felton (Karel Doormanlaan wife and I are going to retire in June of stenogastrine genera, is nearing 197, 2283AM Rijswick, The this year. We are moving to the State of completion. One effect of this will be to Netherlands) reports that his recent Washington, near where I spent my triple the number of valid species, not studies on Gorytes laticinctus, Nite/a childhood years, and as soon as we get terribly surprising when we consider and the Trypoxy/on figulus group are settled, I plan to do lot more collecting that the genus had never been revised now published (see RECENT and studying. I will be taking a good before and consists of inconspicuous LITERATURE). Available time is now sized collection w~h me and I expect to wasps in Southeast Asia. What is being applied to Mimumesa unicolor I add to tt considerably over the next few surprising is the large number of littoralis in collaboration with George years. The unsolved problems of Philippine endemics among the new Else of the BM(NH). Progress is slow Diodontus are still a challenge to me and species. It was very good luck that I and any suggestions on morphological I will continue to collect specimens and collected in so many parts of the or ecological differences between these gather data in hopes of finding Philippines, with special attention to two would be gratefully received. In the solutions.• stenogastrines. Seike Yamane and I future lies the possibiltty of returning to are planning to revise the second Nitela to look at the Iberian species in Eric Hammerstrom (Backgatan largest genus, Eustenogaster, but it will collaboration with Professor Gayubo at 12, S-614 oo SODERKOPING, Sweden) probably take us qutte a long time. Salamanca. wr~es: "I am an amateur entomologist, "Presently, I am working full-time on especially interested in social aculeate the behavior and chemical ecology of a Marc Tussac (Route du Clos du wasps. I was born in 1962 and live in weevil (that's right, one of those insects loup, Cidex 7521, France 31180- Siiderkoping, a little town on the east with the sharp parts at the opposite Castelmaurou) wr~es "Nous partons en coast of Sweden, 16km southeast from end), while struggling to wrap up the voiture avec mon frere Hubert pour the city of Norrkoping and 180km previous year's wasp taxonomy in an recolter des Hymenopteres durant trois southwest of Stockholm. My orderly way." semaines au Maroc du 28 avril au 21 mai profession is telephone operator. For 1989 (5000 a 6000 km aile-retour a several summers I have studied and Fernando Fernandez C. and partir de Toulouse). Nous allons photographed European Vespinae. In William A. Cublllos (Apartado Aereo explorer Ia zone littorale atlantique a particular, I have been looking for 77038, Bogata 2 D.E., Colombia) wrtte: partir de Kenttra jusqu'a Aqadir -reqion differences between the species of "We are undergraduates in Biology at qui nous a deja donne de nombreuses Dolichovespula in the construction and the National University of Colombia at nouvelles especes-, puis les oasis location of their nests. In that regard the Bogota, now preparing our senior pr9-sahariennes comma Tafraoute, ltterature could be better. Last summer I theses on the Hymenoptera of Colombia Ouarzazate, Zagora. Cette periode de also began looking at ants." Oriental, with special attention to social l'annee est particulierement wasps. Although there is a great interessante pour les Eumenidae. M.W.J. Crosland (School of diversity of species in this part of the Pourquoi pas un voyage dans deux ans, Biological Sciences, University of New country, the pauctty of keys and other 'sur les pas de De Beaumont', dans le South Wales, P.O. Box 1, Kensington, identification materials is causing us sud Algerien (Biskra, Montagnes des N.S.W. AUSTRALIA 2033) announces: considerable difficulty. We would be Aures, etc... ) avec d'autres "I just have received a Fellowship to very interested in communicating with hymenopteristes d'Europe ou d'autres work on the biology and control of the others who have interests similar to continents !! me contacter (voiture et wasp, Vespula germanica, in Australia.· ours and with specialists who might camping)." assist us in identffying Hymenoptera." Christian Schmid-Egger ( U. Kirschbaumlebuck 18, D-7840 S.K. Gupta (Zoological Survey of Mullheim, West Germany) and India, Northern Regional Station, 218, Reinhold Treiber (Eugen-Nagele­ Kaulagrh Road, DEHRA DUN- 248195, Str. 29, D-7290 Freudenstadt) are INDIA) reports "I have completed the working on the distribution and ecology systematic studies of the family of Po/istes bischoffi Weyr. in southern Scoliidae from India. At the present, I MISSING PERSONS Germany. Any information about this am engaged in the systematics of the wasp would be welcome. families Tiphiidae and Sphecidae from Tom Muir (of Reston. VA) the Indian Subcontinent with special Maury Walsh (of Columbus, Ohio) APRIL89 3 Johan BUlen (of Brussels, Belgium) behavioral data whose interpretation Larry French (of Davis, Cam.) HELP NEEDED could be enriched by precise Laurence Packer (of Sydney, information on relatedness.