144 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



A NEW BEE OF THE GENUS MEGACHILE FROM 



AFRICA. 



By T. D. a. Cockerell. 



Megachile ekuivella, n. sp. 



2 • Length about 9 mm. ; black, with a short broad heart-shaped 

 abdomen ; face broad, eyes prominent, converging below ; sides of 

 face, cheeks, and base of mandibles with copious snow-w^hite hair 

 (that on face varying in some specimens to yellowish) ; vertex with 

 fuscous hair ; mandibles with three evident teeth, but the fourth or 

 inner one obsolete ; clypeus densely punctured, but with a median 

 rather elevated smooth shining band ; front very densely rugoso- 

 punctate ; antennas black ; mesothorax and scutellum as densely 

 punctured as is possible, dullish, with short hair, mixed dark fuscous 

 and pale ochreous, the latter predominating ; sides and under part of 

 thorax, and femora, with white hair ; hair on inner side of tarsi 

 orange : hind basitarsus broadened and flattened ; claws with a basal 

 tooth ; tegulae dark fuscous in the middle, hyaline and reddish on the 

 margin ; wings dusky, nervures black ; abdomen with entire orange- 

 fulvous hair bands on the apical margins of the segments ; last dorsal 

 segment with black bristles ; ventral scopa bright orange-fulvous, 

 white basally, black on last segment. 



With the females comes a male, assumed tobeconspecific: — 



^ . . Hair of head and thorax above mixed black and white, not 

 ochreous ; hair-bands of abdomen white, with coarse black hair on the 

 discs between them ; antennae slender, black ; wings strongly dusky ; 

 anterior tarsi simple ; anterior coxae without spines ; claws cleft, the 

 inner tooth the smaller ; carina of sixth abdominal segment jagged, 

 with little truncate spines or teeth, three or four on each side, the 

 median interval rounded, but not especially large ; no subapical 

 spines or teeth beneath. 



Hah. Hinterland of Benguella, January 3rd, 1908, female 

 type (Wellman) ; Ekuiva Valley, five females, one male; tsvo of 

 the females at flowers of Compositse (Wellman). 



This little species is related to M. cariciiia, Ckll., but is 

 smaller, and easily distinguished in the female by the mainly 

 pale ochreous hair of the scutellum (that of caricina being coarse 

 and black) and the orange-fulvous abdominal hair-bauds. The 

 male differs conspicuously in the jagged carina of sixth abdo- 

 minal segment. M. venusta, Smith, judging by the description, 

 seems to have many points of resemblance, but the abdominal 

 bands are white in venusta, and the scopa is not black apically. 

 Even closer resemblance may be found in M. cordata, Smith, 

 from Natal, but Smith makes no mention of any black or fuscous 

 hair on the dorsal surface. 



