Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)

Family: Cynipidae | Genus: Disholcaspis
Detachable: detachable
Color: brown, tan
Texture: hairless
Abundance:
Shape: conical, cluster
Season: Fall, Summer
Alignment: erect, supine, leaning
Walls: thick
Location: stem
Form: bullet
Cells: monothalamous
Possible Range:i
Common Name(s):
Synonymy:
Pending...
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image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
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image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)
image of Disholcaspis fungiformis (agamic)

New species and synonymy of American Cynipidae

Disholcaspis fungiformis, new species

[only female described]

GALLS.-A very curious cluster (Figs. 37 to 39) of brownish, mushroom-shaped,twig galls. Each gall is small, composed of three distinct parts: a solid top which is abroad, flattened cone 7-10 mm. in diameter but barely 4 mm. in height, the upper surface irregularly pitted, buff-brown, with the apex dark brown; a small, solid stem not 2 mm. in diameter and 2 or 3 mm. long connecting this cap with the base which contains the larval cell; a base which is a broad, inverted cone, the apex being the point of attachment on the twig, with an irregular, flaring, thin, leaf-like cup extending from this base up and around the cap of the gall, resembling an enormously developed cup at the base of a mushroom. Each gall is monothalamous, the larval cell occupying most of the basal part of the gall, the cell distinct from but tightly enclosed in the surrounding tissue. On the twigs of a variety of Quercus virginiana [presumably this refers to Quercus fusiformis].

RANGE.-Texas: Tiger Mills, Burnett Co. (Schaupp); San Carlos (in Coll.Gray Herb.).

The gall is the most curiously complicated structure I have seen among cynipid productions. It is possible that it is of quite a different form when young and fresh. I find additional specimens of these; galls on oak material in the collections of the Gray Herbarium of Harvard University. This material was collected in November 1831 and is from San Carlos, Texas, which is over four hundred miles from the locality of the type material.

The general shape of this gall is very different from that of most of the species of Disholcaspis, but the location and character of the larval cell is typical for that genus. The insect is a true Disholcaspis.

- Alfred Kinsey: (1920) New species and synonymy of American Cynipidae©


Further Information:
Pending...

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