1968] 
Evans — Neotropical Poinpilidae 
5 
A search for possible examples in other genera has also been pro- 
ductive. For example, the male of Austrochares mexicanus Dreisbach 
is colored strikingly like Poecilopo?npilus flavopictus and several social 
wasps; the female, however, is black with an orange abdomen, a com- 
mon pattern among wasps and probably aposematic (Evans, 1966). 
The South American Austrochares autrani (Holmberg) is similarly 
colored. In both cases the sexes have only recently been associated. 
It should be added that there are many cases in which the females 
are aposematically colored or colored so as to resemble Mutillidae 
or other powerful stingers, but in most such cases the males are simply 
black and non-mimetic (e.g., Psorthaspis formosa, Aporus idris ; 
Evans, 1 966 ) . Also, in nearly all other cases of Pepsis mimicry, both 
sexes share the bright orange wings and dark bodies (in Pepsis j Hemi- 
pepsis , Priocnemioides , many Chirodamus , Cryptocheilus , etc.). In a 
number of cases certain species are Pe/tfw-mimics within the range 
of orange-winged Pepsis, but non-mimetic, black wasps outside of the 
range of the model (e.g., Cryptocheilus idoneum ; Townes, 1957)* 
Dual mimicry appears to be a relatively uncommon phenomenon in 
the Pompilidae, though doubtless more cases will be discovered. 
Henry Townes has pointed out to me that a. generally similar sexual 
dimorphism in color occurs in many ichneumon wasps, particularly 
in the subfamily Ichneumoninae, and in certain Scoliidae in which 
there are large patches of orange in the females while the males lack 
the orange and are black with yellow banding. Such instances also 
suggest that each sex has evolved to copy a. different aposematic or 
mimetic pattern, although the resemblance is of a more generalized 
type than that described here. The possible origin of such color 
dimorphism is discussd following a more detailed description of dual 
mimicry in Chirodamus. 
DESCRIPTION OF DUAL MIMICRY IN CHIRODAMUS 
It should first of all be pointed out that many species of Chirodainus 
have black or blue-black bodies and bright orange wings in both sexes, 
for example, the western North American pyrrhomelas Walker and 
the South American fidanzae Holmberg. Other species, in many 
cases those occurring in areas where orange-winged Pepsis are rare 
or absent, are black with black or hyaline wings (e.g., C. fortis Cres- 
son, in eastern United States, and C. kingii Haliday, the type species, 
in Patagonia). Members of the argentinicus group range from 
northern Argentina to Brazil and Ecuador, an area, in which both 
orange- winged Pepsis and conspicuously banded social Vespidae and 
their various mimics are very common. 
