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Photographs
© Simon van Noort (Iziko Museums of South Africa). |
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Polistes
marginalis nesting in a
Protea plant in
Scarborough, Cape Peninsula (South Africa).
Photographs © Marian Oliver. |
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Polistes
marginalis competing with an alien invasive
Polistes
dominula wasp for food
(Photograph © Karla Haupt) |
Polistes
marginalis nest on window eave (Fairy Knowe, Cape Town).
Photograph
© Simon van Noort (Iziko Museums of South Africa). |
Photograph © Mike Picker & Charles
Griffiths (University of Cape Town)
(published
in Struik's
Field Guide to Insects of South Africa) as Polistes fastidiosus. |
Agulhas National Park S 34 43'14.90'' E 19 55'11.56''
Altitude 14 m.
Photograph © Jonathan Ball (Tokai). |
Mated female overwintering in the shelter of a burnt
Protea caffra head in
Umtamvuna Nature Reserve, Western Heights,
31.003147 degrees S, 30.158522 degrees E, altitude 420m. Photograph ©
Graham Grieve.
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Rondevlei
Nature Reserve, robbing nectar from flower of Erica verticillata.
Photograph © Dalton Gibbs. |
Gauteng. Photograph © Simon van Noort (Iziko Museums of
South Africa).
Hermanus. Photograph ©
Alexander Wirth.
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Diagnosis
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Tarsal claws on mid and hind legs symmetrical in size
(asymmetrical in P. fastidiosus). Colour variable, usually with
black areas on reddish-orange ground colour. Pale yellow terminal bands
on first two or three metasomal (abdominal) segments. Specimens smaller
(8-12 mm in length), than in P. fastidious (13-17 mm in length). |
Distribution
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Burkina Faso, Ethiopia,
Eritrea, Kenya, Lesotho, Niger, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, South
Africa, Tanzania including Zanzibar,
Yémen. |
Biology |
Social, constructing communal paper nests comprising a
single comb with downward pointing cells. Larvae are fed
on chewed-up, soft-bodied insects such as caterpillars. See
Polistinae
Paper wasp home page for more details. |
References |
Bequaert, J.C. 1918.
A revision of the Vespidae of the Belgian Congo based on the collection of the
American Museum Congo Expedition: with a list of Ethiopian diplopterous wasps.
Bulletin of the AMNH 39: 1-384.
Carpenter, J. M. & M.
Madl. 2009. A catalogue of the Vespidae of the Malagasy Subregion (Insecta,
Hymenoptera). Linzer Biologische Beiträge 41 (2): 1871-1935.
Picker,
M., Griffiths, C & Weaving, A. 2002. Field Guide to Insects of South Africa.
Struik Publishers, Cape Town. |
Credits
|
Photographs
© Simon van Noort (Iziko Museums of South Africa) or
© Marian Oliver (Cape Town, Scarborough specimen)
or © Jonathan Ball (Tokai) or © Graham Grieve (Munster) or © Alexander
Wirth (Germany) or © Mike Picker & Charles Griffiths (University of Cape Town)
published
in Struik's
Field Guide to Insects of South Africa as Polistes fastidiosus.
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