Home » Guide » Arthropods (Arthropoda) » Hexapods (Hexapoda) » Insects (Insecta) » Ants, Bees, Wasps and Sawflies (Hymenoptera) » "Symphyta" - Sawflies, Horntails, and Wood Wasps » Horntail Wasps (Siricidae) » Siricinae » Sirex

Genus Sirex

Curious to know if this is some type of a wasp? - Sirex

Likely Sirex varipes horntail, Washoe Valley Nevada - Sirex - female

Exploring a Recently Fallen Tree - Sirex nigricornis - female

Classification

Kingdom Animalia (Animals)

Phylum Arthropoda (Arthropods)

Subphylum Hexapoda (Hexapods)

Class Insecta (Insects)

Order Hymenoptera (Ants, Bees, Wasps and Sawflies)

No Taxon ("Symphyta" - Sawflies, Horntails, and Wood Wasps)

Family Siricidae (Horntail Wasps)

Subfamily Siricinae

Genus Sirex

Synonyms and other taxonomic changes

S. californicus (Ashmead) is now treated as separate sp., not a ssp. of S. juvencus, which is a strictly Palaearctic species, frequently intercepted but not established in NA(1)

multiple new junior synonyms of S. nigricornis recently established in(1)

Explanation of Names

Sirex Linnaeus 1761

Numbers

14 spp. in our area (of which one adventive), 28 total(1)

Range

Holarctic; in our area, mostly western(1)

Food

associated with conifers, mostly Pinaceae(2)

Remarks

Associated inside their wooden galleries with several fungal species in the genera Stereum and Daedalea. The fungus probably is transmitted by the female with her ovipositor and helps the larvae to digest wood. The future female larvae carry an inoculum in a waxy cavity behind the thorax, between the 1st and 2nd abdominal segments.(3)

Works Cited

1.	Siricidae (Hymenoptera: Symphyta: Siricoidea) of the Western Hemisphere Schiff, N.M., Goulet, H., Smith, D.R., Boudreault, C., Wilson, A.D., and Scheffler, B.E. 2012. Canadian Journal of Arthropod Identification No. 21: 305 pp.

2.	Guide to the siricid woodwasps of North America Schiff N.M., Valley S.A., LaBonte J.R., Smith D.R. 2006. USDA Forest Service, Forest Health Technology Enterprise Team, Morgantown, WV. 101 pp.

3.	Interrelationship Between Insects and Plants Pierre Jolivet. 1998. CRC Press.

Contributed by v belov on 23 September, 2010 - 1:48pm
Additional contributions by Marci Hess, PaleoJon
Last updated 11 September, 2023 - 9:30am

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