Cynips (dugèsi) luminata, new species
agamic form
GALL.-Similar to all galls of the C. dugès i complex. Mature galls light rosy tan to bright rose, becoming light to dirty brown with age; some times unspotted, sometimes obscurely spotted or mottled with purplish; fairly large galls up to 32. mm., averaging nearer 22. mm. in diameter.
HOST.-Quercus decipiens [rugosa], the white oak with the largest and coarsest leaves in the region.
RANGE.-Guatemala: Huehuetenango, 3 S, 7300'. Huehuetenango, 14 S, 7500': Quezaltenango, 5 N, 8800'. SololĂĄ, 11 N, 8500'. San Marcos, 5 E, 8000'. San Marcos, 3 W, 8200'. Restricted to the one oak, but probably ranging throughout the high mountain mass of Southwestern Guatemala; possibly extending into the connecting mountains of Chiapas. Figure 18.
LIFE HISTORY.-Galls still soft, not wholly mature in last week of December. ADULTS: January 7, 8, 14, 21, 29.
This insect and C. lucaris account for the oak apples of the main mountain mass of Southwestern Guatemala. Luminata is confined to the coarse-leaved oak which belongs to the Q, decipiens complex. Lucaris is on the âchestnut oak,â Q. pilicaulis, in the same area, although pilicaulis usually occurs a few hundred or thousand feet below the other oak. Both of the insects show relations to C. longa, from the southern end of the state of Hidalgo, north of Mexico City, nearly 300 miles from the Guate malan border. They are not closely related to the long-spined insects which break off of the dugèsi stocks near Mexico City.
â- Alfred Kinsey: (1936) Origin of higher categories in CynipsŠ