Notes on Zethini (Hymenoptera, Vespidae, Eumeninae): complementary sex descriptions, synonymies and a new species of Zethus Fabricius.

This paper brings a series of contributions to the taxonomy of the Zethini: description of a new species, Zethus denticlypeus Lopes, sp. n.; description of the female of Z. anomalus Cooper, 1999; description of the males of Z. angustior Bohart Stange, 1965, Z. clypeolaris Bohart Stange, 1965, Z. satanicus Bohart Stange, 1965 and Argentozethus willinki Stange, 1979; synonymy of Discoelius argentinus Brèthes, 1905 under Z. dicomboda Spinola, 1851; and rearrangements for the species of Raphiglossoides Giordani Soika, 1936, with Raphiglossoides minutus (Gusenleitner, 2000) (= R. aethiopicus Giordani Soika, 1936) and R. gibbus (Gusenletiner, 2000) n. comb.

Zethus (Zethus) pilosus Zavattari, 1912 (Hymenoptera: Vespidae: Eumeninae) from Southern Brazil: description of the female, the male genitalia, its nest and notes on biology.

Zethus is the largest vespid genus and, despite being very diverse in the Neotropical region, little is known about its biology and many species are known from only one sex. Zethini are centered in one of the controversies involving Vespidae phylogeny; increased knowledge of terminals will allow for more precise analyses, because some phylogenetically informative characters are observed in only one sex and others can be extracted from nests. With this in mind, complementary knowledge on Zethus pilosus is presented: the description of the female, of the male genitalia, of the nest and notes in its biology. Additional key features in the pronotum for identification of this species are provided. Nests were founded between December and April, presenting construction of partitions out of a combination of mud, sand, vegetable matter and insect parts. Development from egg to adult lasted an average of 39 days.

A new species of Zethus (Zethusculus) de Saussure (Hymenoptera, Vespidae, Eumeninae) from southern Brazil

Zethus (Zethusculus) paschoali, a new species from Piraquara, Paraná, Brazil, is described and pictures comparing it to similar species are presented.