Cynips quercusphellos

Cynips quercussimilis

Callirhytis quercussimilis

Callirhytis quercusphellos

Cynipidae

Zapatella

Quercus buckleyi

Kansas

Oklahoma

Texas

Quercus falcata

Alabama

Arkansas

Delaware

Florida

Georgia

Illinois

Indiana

Kentucky

Louisiana

Maryland

Mississippi

Missouri

New Jersey

New York

North Carolina

Ohio

Pennsylvania

South Carolina

Tennessee

Virginia

West Virginia

Quercus ilicifolia

Connecticut

Maine

Massachusetts

New Hampshire

Rhode Island

Vermont

Ontario

Quercus imbricaria

Iowa

Michigan

Quercus incana

Quercus inopina

Quercus laurifolia

Quercus myrtifolia

Quercus phellos

Quercus rubra

Minnesota

Nebraska

Wisconsin

New Brunswick

Nova Scotia

Prince Edward Island

Quebec

An illustrated catalogue of American insect galls

Cynipid galls of the eastern United States

Zapatella quercusphellos (sexgen)

Cynips quercus similis n. sp.

 QUERCUS ILICIFOLIA. Club-shaped, woody galls, growing on the ends of the small limbs. Apex blunt and generally turned to one side, covered in summer with a few leaves and containing one, and occasionally two or three larvae. It is strikingly like that of C. q. tuber of Fitch, but produces a fly which though closely related, is evidently a different species.

Descriptions of several new species of Cynips and a new species of Diastrophus

Category: Monothalamous terminal enlargements or club-galls of twigs

Callirhytis similis Bass. 1864. p 683. (Cynips) Q. ilicifolia, Conn; Harvard Coll, NY; Beut. Cat., Q. nana [ilicifolia], Q ilicifolia, NJ; Q ilicifolia, Q stellata [presumably an error?], Mass, RI.

Description: Terminal or not terminal.




Callirhytis similis (Bass.)

Quercus falcata, ilicifolia, imbricaria, myrtifolia, texana [buckleyi]
Stem galls, woody stem swellings
Woody, club-shaped when terminal, with 1-5 cells. June. Described from Quercus ilicifolia.

[Photo caption] On Q ilicifolia. Also on imbricaria, falcata, cinerea [incana], myrtifolia. Green and fleshy in May, becoming woody later. Adults emerged June 26, 28, 30, and July 3 (DC).

Callirhytis phellos (Ashm.) 

Quercus imbricaria
Terminal on new shoots in spring, the larval cell supported by inconspicuous fibers.

Quercus laurifolia, phellos
Club-shaped at end of new shoots in spring with radiating fibers about the larval cell. 3-5 mm in dia.

[Photo caption] On Q. phellos. Also on Q imbricaria. Terminal on new growth. Maker emerges in late June (DC).

Callirhytis quercusphellos (Osten Sacken 1861)

Hosts: Quercus inopina, myrtifolia

[Asexual generation stem swelling gall found in Florida in the spring.]

Callirhytis quercussimilis (Bassett 1864)

Hosts: Quercus inopina, myrtifolia

[Sexual generation stem swelling gall found in Florida in the spring.]

Using gall wasps on oaks to test broad ecological concepts

 Zapatella quercusphellos

(Osten Sacken) comb. n.

Cynips quercusphellos Osten Sacken, 1861. Callirhytis quercusphellos (Osten Sacken ) (Burks 1979).

Cynips quercussimilis Bassett, 1864, syn. n. Callirhytis quercussimilis (Bassett) (Burks 1979).

Callirhytis (Cynips) quercussimilis (sexual form) was known, inducing stem swelling galls on Quercus incana, Quercus falcata, Quercus ilicifolia Wangenh., Quercus imbricaria Michx., and Quercus myrtifolia along the Atlantic coast, from Florida to New York state (Burks 1979). The galls are club-shaped swellings if they form on terminal twigs, with 1–4 cells (Weld 1959). Green and fleshy galls develop in May, and later turn woody (become lignified). Adults emerge in June to the beginning of July (Bassett 1864, Weld 1959).

The author of Callirhytis quercusphellos (Osten Sacken 1861) collected greenish rounded woody swellings at the tip of the twigs of Quercus phellos (L.) in Virginia, near Potomac river in June; four sexual females emerged by the end of June Osten Sacken (1865) mentioned that his species somehow resembles Callirhytis quercussimilis (Bassett), however, differs from it. Dalla Torre and Kieffer (1910) treated them as different species. Weld (1922b) erroneously synonymised Cynips similis Bassett to Callirhytis quercusphellos (O.S.). Later, the two species were treated as different species (Weld 1926, 1928, 1951, 1959; Burks 1979). Weld (1922b) observed galls absolutely similar to those of Zapatella quercusphellos on Quercus falcata, Quercus incana, Quercus texana Buckley, Quercus laurifolia Michx. and Quercus myrtifolia.

Zapatella quercusphellos was collected also at Rosslyn, Virginia from Quercus imbricaria in June and Quercus phellos in May, adults emerged in late June. In both cases the greenish fresh galls were similar terminal enlargements on new growths, inconspicuous, only 5 mm long; after maturation galls were 8–10 mm in diameter (Weld 1926).

A detail examination of specimens of Callirhytis quercusphellos and Callirhytis quercussimilis, mentioned above, showed no appreciable morphological differences and thus, Callirhytis quercussimilis is a syn. n. of Callirhytis quercusphellos and here in the species transferred to the Zapatella genus, Zapatella quercusphellos, comb. n. 

Only the sexual generation is known. It induces stem swelling galls on Quercus incana, Quercus falcata, Quercus ilicifolia Wangenh., Quercus imbricaria, Quercus myrtifolia and Quercus phellos along the Atlantic coast, from Florida to New York state (Burks 1979).

A new genus of oak gallwasps, Zapatella Pujade-Villar & Melika, gen. n., with a description of two new species from the Neotropics (Hymenoptera, Cynipidae, Cynipini).