Feron gigas
(agamic)agamic:The agamic (AKA unisexual) generation of an oak gall wasp (cynipini) species consists of only female wasps, which do not mate before laying the eggs which become the male and females of the sexual generation (sexgen).
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Location: upper leaf, lower leaf, between leaf veins
Form:
Cells:
Possible Range:
The gall's range is computed from the range of all hosts that the gall occurs on. In some cases we have evidence that the gall does not occur across the full range of the hosts and we will remove these places from the range. For undescribed species we will show the expected range based on hosts plus where the galls have been observed.
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Common Name(s):
Saucer Gall Wasp (unisexual generation)
Created Feb 4, 2026 1:47 PM UTC
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Last updated Feb 4, 2026 1:47 PM UTC
Re-establishment of the Nearctic oak cynipid gall wasp genus Feron Kinsey, 1937 (Hymenoptera: Cynipidae: Cynipini), including the description of six new species
Victor Cuesta-Porta, George Melika, James, A. Nicholls, Graham N. Stone, Juli Pujade-Villar
(2023)
Feron gigas (Kinsey, 1922), comb. nov.
Galls. Asexual spangle galls (Fig. 215) about 4 mm in diameter, usually on the upper side of the leaf, saucer shaped, with a thin crenate margin when young, with a prominent hump in center. The mature gall has a lens-shaped larval cavity inside, on the floor of which is a thin, white, circular disk with radiating prominent lines.
Biology. Alternation of sexual and asexual generations was determined by Dailey & Sprenger (1973a). Alternate sexual and asexual generations are also confirmed herein using DNA data, with four individuals (three asexual females, one sexual male) sequenced for cytb and three individuals (two asexual females, one sexual male) sequenced for cytb. Cytb sequences were on average 0.82% divergent (range 0–1.66%; GenBank accessions KX683598, OQ446198–OQ446199) and ITS2 sequences were identical among the three individuals except for two additional bases within a polyA region in one sample (GenBank accessions OQ448240–OQ448242).
This species induces galls on Q. douglasii and Q. dumosa (section Quercus, subsection Dumosae). Young asexual galls are present in August, mature in autumn; asexual adults emerge in February. Sexual galls are mature in April; adults emerge by the end of April.