A SOLITARY WASP (APHILANTHOPS FRIGIDUS F. 

 SMITH) THAT PROVISIONS ITS NEST WITH 



QUEEN ANTS 1 



WILLIAM MORTON WHEELER 



Several years ago a correspondent sent me a few specimens 

 of a beautiful black and yellow wasp, Aphilanthops jrigidus F. 

 Smith, each mounted on a pin with a winged queen of the typical 

 Formica jusca L. These specimens were collected August 21, 

 1903, at Silver Creek, Baraga County, in northern Michigan, by 

 Mr. Morgan Hebard. Although it seemed very probable that 

 the ants had been taken as the prey of the wasps, I was not 

 sure of this fact till the past summer, when I was able to study 

 the habits of these insects in the neighborhood of Boston. During 

 this season, in fact, they seem to have been so abundant as to 

 have attracted the attention of other entomologists in New Eng- 

 land and Canada. 



The nearctic genus Aphilanthops was first separated from the 

 closely related Philanthus by Patton in 1880 and based on Ph. 

 jrigidus F. Smith as the type. Since that time Cresson (1865), 

 Fox (1894), Baker (1895), Cockerell (1895, T 896) and Dunning 

 (1896, 1898) have described a number of additional species. 

 Eleven of these altogether are enumerated by Dunning in his 

 monograph of the genus (1898), all confined to the western 

 states, except the type A . jrigidus. This was originally described 

 from Nova Scotia, but is now known to range over Ontario and 

 New England, as far west as Illinois and Chicago and as far 

 south as New Jersey. Two other species from Mexico have been 

 referred to the genus Aphilanthops by Cameron, but Cockerell 

 believes that they really belong to the genus Eucerceris. 



Concerning the habits of Aphilanthops nothing has been pub- 

 lished, except the following observations by Ainslee (1909) on 

 A. taurulus Ckll.: "Early in August, 1908, while marooned at 



1 Contributions from the Entomological Laboratory of the Bussey Institution, 

 Harvard University, No. 71. 



374 



