Masked Mud-nesting Wasp
S2, Male, Wing Venation
Ellura
Masked Mud-nesting Wasp
S1, Female, posterior
 
                      
Masked Mud-nesting Wasp (Anterhynchium (Epiodynerus) nigrocinctum ssp nigrocinctum)Class: Animals (Animalia) - Jointed Legs (Arthropoda) - Insects (Insecta)
Order: Ant Bee Wasps (Hymenoptera)
Family: Potter Wasp (Wasp: Vespidae)     iNaturalist Observation
Species: Masked Mud-nesting Wasp (Anterhynchium (Epiodynerus) nigrocinctum ssp nigrocinctum)
This Photo:     🔍S4, Female, Wing Venation🔎

Thank you Marco Selis for identifying this species for us

General Species Information:
Found on Ellura (in the Murray Mallee, SA) and elsewhere
Males ~12 to ~14mm long. Female ~17mm long, so larger. Females have 10 flagellomeres. The tip of the male antennae (the last segment) are turned back pointy affairs. There is a tiny segment (2nd from the end) that makes it 11 flagellomeres for the males (which almost all Apocrita have). The females are blunt ended. The genders can also be separated by the abdominal segment count; males with 7 & females with 6.
Of those we've found the females have more of an orange face, where as the males have a very yellow face (specifically the clypeus (bottom plate), and bottom half of the frons (top plate)).
We thought this was an Abispa sp.
Marco said "Anterhynchium (Epiodynerus) nigrocinctum nigrocinctum is the complete name, as in Eastern Indonesia occurs the subspecies Anterhynchium nigrocinctum meraukense. The differences are very slight and involve only the extension of orange pattern, they are just variations in my opinion."

Similar Species: Large Mud-nesting Wasp (Abispa ephippium)

Copyright © 2024 Brett & Marie Smith. All Rights Reserved. Photographed 08-Nov-2024
This species is an Australian Native Species, not listed in the SA Murray Mallee Survey of 2010.