PSYCHE 
Vol. 75 
March, 1968 
No. 1 
STUDIES ON NEOTROPICAL 
POMPILIDAE (HYMENOPTERA) 
IV. EXAMPLES OF DUAL SEX-LIMITED 
MIMICRY IN CHIRODAMUS 1 
By Howard E. Evans 
Museum of Comparative Zoology 
INTRODUCTION 
Taxonomy is considered a branch of biology, but it might equally 
well be regarded as a special kind of detective work. One gathers 
evidence from diverse sources and tries to build a case for the natural 
classification of a group. On occasion the result is a “hung jury”: 
the evidence does not fit together into a convincing picture. On oc- 
casion — but all too rarely — the evidence leads on into broader 
problems than originally supposed and provides new insights into bio- 
logical phenomena. I believe that the present investigation is such 
a case, and I shall present the evidence much as it came to me. Much 
of it is circumstantial or even suppositional, but not any more so than 
is often true in taxonomy. The conclusion — that certain South 
American spider wasps of the genus Chirodamus have males that are 
Batesian mimics of one complex of wasps and females that are Mul- 
lerian mimics of a very different complex — is so far as I know a 
novel facet of the mimicry problem. 
The story begins in 1945, when Nathan Banks described a new 
genus of pompilid wasps from South America, calling it Amerocnemis. 
He based this on one female, described as A . bequaerti , and several 
males which he did not describe at that time. In his review of the 
South American Pepsinae in 1946, Banks described three species from 
the male sex: argentinica , brasiliensis , and longula. In 1957, Townes 
Acknowledgment is made to the William Morton Wheeler Fund of the 
Museum of Comparative Zoology for assuming the cost of the colored plate 
and of publication. 
Manuscript received by the editor December 5, 1967. 
I 
