Cynips fulvicollis variety fulvicollis
bisexual form pallipes (Bassett)
Dryophanta pallipes
Diplolepis pallipes
GALL. — A rather elongate but still broadly egg-shaped cell with one end (the base) truncate, flat; reddish-brown and dark brown in color; the surface all but microscopically smooth ; the cell wall thin, hard and brittle, occasionally with more than one layer (as several bud scales become involved in the gall); entirely empty, without a separate larval cell; up to 3.5 mm. in length. Buried inside otherwise unmodified buds, or deforming and dwarfing clusters of leaves which become slender and thread-like about the gall; on Quercus alba. Figure 231.
RANGE. — Probably the same as that of the corresponding agamic form [this seems to be what we know as Philonix nigra] which occurs everywhere on Q. alba, from Massachusetts to Iowa and the Ohio River Valley (fig. 41). The bisexual form known definitely only from: Connecticut: Waterbury (Bassett, types). New York: state (acc. Beutenmiiller 1911). New Jersey: state (acc. Beutenmiiller 1911). Pennsylvania: state (acc. Beutenmiiller 1911). Indiana: Charlestown (E. W. Spieth in Kinsey collection).
These bisexual insects have been previously known only from Bassett’s very scant collection and from Beutenmuller’s records for which I have not seen material. I have secured 16 insects and numerous galls from southern Indiana by bagging large numbers of unopened buds of Q. alba in the early spring.
The date of appearance of the adult insect will vary as the latitude and season may affect the development of the buds of the oaks in the region. In southern Indiana adults were emerging from the galls on April 22 and May 1 in 1927. Bassett did not find the galls appearing in Connecticut until early May, while the insects emerged later in May. This insect has gone uninterpreted since Bassett's original discovery, but the following considerations now seem to lead to our conclusion that this is the bisexual form of no less common an insect than Cynips fulvicollis fulvicollis.
Pallipes is undoubtedly the alternate of some eastern American species of agamic Cynips for which at least some variety is already described. No Eastern species of Cynips (as categories are used in this paper) has been added to our list since 1882, altho new varieties are still being discovered.
The only eastern American Cynips left for consideration as a possible alternate of pallipes is some variety of fulvicollis. Fulvicollis and pezomachoides are the only Cynips common on Q. alba in the northeastern quarter of the United States.
Cynips gemmula (link in text)
bisexual forms
GALL OF BISEXUAL FORMS.— A thin-walled, egg-shaped cell, occurring singly in the buds of the chestnut oaks. Known for only a single variety, so see the description for variety gemmula bisexual form gemmula.
Cynips gemmula variety gemmula
bisexual form gemmula
Cynips gemula
Dryophanta gemula
Diplolepis gemmula
GALL. — A small, thin-walled, elongate, egg-shaped cell in a bud. Monothalamous, about 2.0 to 3.0 mm. long, regular in form, nearly egg-shaped but somewhat more elongate, pointed apically, truncate at base; microscopically roughened; older galls dark brown to blackish. Very thin-walled, brittle when dry, without a distinct larval cell. Singly, deep and nearly hidden in the leaf or flower buds, or at the apices of young stems or on the main stems of the staminate flowers and surrounded by a few deformed bracts; on Quercus prinoides. Figures 305, 306, 335.
RANGE. — Probably as given for the agamic form prinoides (fig. 62) ; probably restricted to an area on or near the Atlantic Coastal Plain. This bisexual form known only from: Massachusetts: eastern part (M. T. Thompson coll. No. 166). Connecticut: Waterbury (types, Bassett). New Jersey: Lakehurst (acc. Beutenmuller 1911).
Altho not represented by many collections, the good-sized series of this insect in the Bassett and Thompson collections indicate that proper search should reveal this as a very com- mon even if obscure form in the leaf and flower buds of the chinquapin oak, Q. prinoides. Bassett described the galls as fully developed when the staminate flowers of the oak are in bloom. He remarked that “When the gall happens to be in a leaf bud, it is often found at the summit of a young branch one or two inches long, so rapid is the growth of the tree at this season. . . . The insects appear in both sexes about the middle of May ...” [at Waterbury, Connecticut] . A Bassett specimen in the American Museum is labelled as in coitu on May 10 (1879) . Thompson found the galls late in May in eastern Massachusetts, and Beutenmuller recorded (in Smith 1910 :599) galls occurring in May and June— the cells probably being empty for some time before they disappear from the dried-up flower buds.
Bassett originally spelled this name gemula, a feminine adjective meaning moaning or complaining. It seems evident that Bassett intended to write gemmula, a noun meaning a small bud. This would aptly describe the gall of this insect. Perhaps it is not certain that Article 19 of the International Rules allows an emendation of this original form as a lapsus calami; but perhaps we need common sense rather than rules in this case. Gemmula is here taken to be the bisexual form alternating with the agamic prinoides. My reasons for this opinion are as follows :
The insect shows the generic characters of a bisexual Cynips as established by the life histories experimentally determined for varieties of folii and divisa, and for erinacei. The insect belongs to the subgenus Acraspis, as evidenced by the character of the hypopygial spine, the wing-body ratio, and the blotches (even tho obscure) in the cubital cell.
The relation to an agamic Acraspis is further proved by the close resemblance of gemmuia to bicolens, the experimentally demonstrated bisexual form of Cynips pezornachoides erinacei.
That gemmuia is not also a form of pezornachoides is shown by the host on which it occurs, namely Quercus prinoides, one of the chestnut oaks. Pezornachoides occurs only on the true white oaks of the Q. alba group, and is rigidly excluded from the chestnut oaks.
Cynips hirta and prinoides are the only agamic forms of Acraspis known from the chestnut oaks, and prinoides is the only Acraspis known from Quercus prinoides.
Prinoides , then, seems to be the only agamic Cynips of which gemmuia might be the alternate, and none of the data are in conflict with the conclusion that these two are really alternates.
