Pöllein, Daniela;Kuhlmann, Michael
Sphecodopsis
Sign in to saveSphecodopsis is a genus of cleptoparasitic cuckoo bees in the family Apidae. Endemic to southern Africa, the wasp-like bees of this genus are generally small, varying from in length, and mostly black, with orange-ish or reddish colouring of the metasoma in some of the species. The bee genus Scrapter is recognised as a host for the cleptoparasitic life cycle of some Sphecodopsis, but further data regarding preferred hosts is not available for most of the species.
Museum specimens
- Specimen records
- 14
- Family
- Apidae
- Collections
- PPRI, KU
- Recorded in
- South Africa, United States
Wikidata facts
- Instance of
- taxon
- Parent taxon
- Ammobatini
- Image
- Sphecodopsis sp, Sandveld, 2012.jpg
Show 4 more facts
- taxon name
- Sphecodopsis
- taxon rank
- genus
- topic's main category
- Category:Sphecodopsis
- Commons category
- Sphecodopsis
Sources (1)
via Wikidata · CC0
~6 min read
Encyclopedic overview
6 sectionsContents
- Taxonomy
- Distribution and habitat
- Morphology
- Behaviour and life cycle
- Species
- References
Sphecodopsis is a genus of cleptoparasitic cuckoo bees in the family Apidae. Endemic to southern Africa, the wasp-like bees of this genus are generally small, varying from in length, and mostly black, with orange-ish or reddish colouring of the metasoma in some of the species. The bee genus Scrapter is recognised as a host for the cleptoparasitic life cycle of some Sphecodopsis, but further data regarding preferred hosts is not available for most of the species.
==Taxonomy== German entomologist Hans Bischoff first described the genus in 1923 in the work "Kenntnis afrikanischer Schmarotzerbienen", published in the Deutsche entomologische Zeitschrift. The genus name is Greek for "wasp-like", with "spheco-" meaning wasp.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Sphecodopsis” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.