REDISCOVERY OF SCOLEBYTHUS MADECASSUS 
WITH A DESCRIPTION OF THE MALE AND OF ’ 
THE FEMALE STING APPARATUS 
(HYMENOPTERA: SCOLEBYTHIDAE) 
By Howard E. Evans , 1 Charles Kugler , 2 
and William L. Brown, Jr . 2 
Introduction 
Scolebythus madecassus was described by Evans (1963) from a 
single female taken by Wulsin at Mandritsara, Madagascar. It is the 
monotype of the genus Scolebythus, which in turn is the type genus 
of family Scolebythidae, a small and rare taxon related to Bethylidae, 
containing two other monotypic genera in addition to Scolebythus: 
Clystopsenella (widespread in Brasil) and Ycaploca (South Africa 
and Australia). Females and males were known for all of these 
genera except Scolebythus, in which only the female holotype has 
been collected until now (Evans 1963, Nagy 1975, Day 1977) 
During February 1977, one of us (WLB) found six living speci¬ 
mens of Scolebythus madecassus in a single small piece of rotten 
wood in disturbed rain forest along the road south from Andasibe 
(formerly Perinet), Madagascar, about 1 km from the railroad 
station and hotel. One of the females among these has been 
compared with the holotype (MCZ) by WLB, and is considered to 
be conspecific. 
The collection was made at about 14.00 hr, just at the beginning 
of a heavy thundershower, on a heavily shaded part of the forest 
floor, where WLB was searching for ants. A small, very rotten stick 
about 15 cm long by 3 cm thick, was picked up out of the leaf litter 
and twisted by hand, so that one end of the stick was split open. A 
small black wasp, appearing in life like a large, long-necked 
bethylid, was found in the large, irregular chamber thus breached; 
'Department of Zoology and Entomology, Colorado State University Fort 
Collins, Colorado 80523. 
-Department of Entomology, Cornell University. Ithaca, N.Y. 14853. Present 
address: Department of Biology, Radford University, Radford, VA 24142 
A report of research from the Cornell University Agricultural Experiment Station. 
Research supported in part by National Science Foundation Grant DEB 75-22427 
Manuscript received by the editor May 18, 1979. 
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