A REVISION OF THE MUTILLID WASPS OF THE 

 GENERA MYRMILLOIDES AND PSEUDOMETHOCA 

 OCCURRING IN AMERICA NORTH OF MEXICO. 



By Clarence E. Mickel, 



Of the Department of Entomology, University of Minnesota. 



This study is the outgrowth of an attempt, several years ago, to 

 identify a large collection of Mutillidae at the University of Ne- 

 braska. In this work it soon became apparent that accurate identi- 

 fication of the North American Mutillidae was hopeless, until some- 

 thing like order could be brought out of the chaotic condition of the 

 generic and specific classifications. Several generic classifications 

 have been proposed, but that outlined by Dr. J. C. Bradley (1916) 

 seems to be the most satisfactory at present for the North American 

 species and, in the main, is the classification followed by the writer. 



Most of the genera recognized in Doctor Bradley's classification 

 need to be studied and revised, and the present paper deals with two 

 of these groups, Myrniilloides Andre and Psevdomethoca Ashmead. 

 The species included by Fox (1899) in his grandiceps group is 

 here placed in the genus M y rmilloides Andre, while those which he 

 included under the canadensis and simillima groups, together with 

 some others are iplaced in a single genus, Psendomethoca Ash- 

 mead. On account of the scarcity of material from Mexico and Cen- 

 tral America and the impossibility of examining the types of many 

 of the species described from those regions, the work has been limited 

 to the forms which are found in North America north of Mexico. 

 A list of the species described from Mexico and Central America 

 which probably belong to the genus Pseudomethoca Ashmead is 

 included herein. 



The females of the various species of Mutillidae are in many cases 

 more or less superficially alike, but the males are even more so. This 

 fact has caused a great deal of confusion in the identification of the 

 males of this family. No less than six different species of males 

 have been found by the writer in a series of specimens which were 

 supposed to include representatives of a single species. In searching 

 for characters by which the males could be separated from one an- 

 other the writer was led to examine the genital structures and found 



No. 2505. — Proceedings U. S. National Museum. Vol. 64, Art. 15. 



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