The ovipositor is a tube-like organ used by some animals, especially insects, for the laying of eggs. In insects, an ovipositor consists of a maximum of three pairs of appendages. The details and morphology of the ovipositor vary, but typically its form is adapted to functions such as preparing a place for the egg, transmitting the egg, and then placing it properly. For most insects, the organ is used merely to attach the egg to some surface, but for many parasitic species, it is a piercing organ as well.
Sawflies are wasp-like insects that are in the suborder Symphyta within the order Hymenoptera, alongside ants, bees, and wasps. The common name comes from the saw-like appearance of the ovipositor, which the females use to cut into the plants where they lay their eggs. The name is associated especially with the Tenthredinoidea, by far the largest superfamily in the suborder, with about 7,000 known species; in the entire suborder, there are 8,000 described species in more than 800 genera. Symphyta is paraphyletic, consisting of several basal groups within the order Hymenoptera, each one rooted inside the previous group, ending with the Apocrita which are not sawflies.
The superfamily Ichneumonoidea contains one extinct and three extant families, including the two largest families within Hymenoptera: Ichneumonidae and Braconidae. The group is thought to contain as many as 100,000 species, many of which have not yet been described. Like other parasitoid wasps, they were long placed in the "Parasitica", variously considered as an infraorder or an unranked clade, now known to be paraphyletic.
The Ichneumonidae, also known as ichneumon wasps, ichneumonid wasps, ichneumonids, or Darwin wasps, are a family of parasitoid wasps of the insect order Hymenoptera. They are one of the most diverse groups within the Hymenoptera with roughly 25,000 species described as of 2016. However, this likely represents less than a quarter of their true richness as reliable estimates are lacking, along with much of the most basic knowledge about their ecology, distribution, and evolution. It is estimated that there are more species in this family than there are species of birds and mammals combined. Ichneumonid wasps, with very few exceptions, attack the immature stages of holometabolous insects and spiders, eventually killing their hosts. They thus fulfill an important role as regulators of insect populations, both in natural and semi-natural systems, making them promising agents for biological control.
Horntail or wood wasp are any of the 150 non-social species of the hymenopteran family Siricidae, a type of wood-eating sawfly. The common name "horntail" derives from the stout, spine-like structure at the end of the adult's abdomen, which is used to pierce the host's bark to allow the eggs to be inserted into the wood. A typical adult horntail is brown, blue, or black with yellow or red parts, and may often reach up to 4 cm (1.6 in) long. The pigeon horntail can grow up to 5 cm (2.0 in) long, among the longest of all Hymenoptera.
A wasp is any insect of the narrow-waisted suborder Apocrita of the order Hymenoptera which is neither a bee nor an ant; this excludes the broad-waisted sawflies (Symphyta), which look somewhat like wasps, but are in a separate suborder. The wasps do not constitute a clade, a complete natural group with a single ancestor, as bees and ants are deeply nested within the wasps, having evolved from wasp ancestors. Wasps that are members of the clade Aculeata can sting their prey.
Xanthocryptus novozealandicus, the lemon tree borer parasite, is a wasp in the family Ichneumonidae. It is a native insect of New Zealand. It is also found in Australia and New Guinea. Females hunt for larvae of wood-boring beetles around March, including the lemon tree borer, a native cerambycid that tunnels into citrus trees, grapes and many native species. When a suitable host is found, the female pushes her ovipositor through the wood and injects her eggs into the grub. This has the incidental benefit of helping to control some pests. X. novozealandicus prefers to prey on second year lemon tree borer larvae. This specific parasite prefers to prey on larger second year larvae due to its larger size.
Xeris spectrum is a kind of horntail or wood wasp, that lives in coniferous forests. It is large wasp with a powerful ovipositor in females. Unlike other Siricid Wood wasps, Xeris spectrum does not have symbiotic fungi to aid its larvae as they burrow in the wood of fir and other conifer trees making it unique in the Siricidae. It is widespread and is found in large parts of Europe, Asia, Africa and North America.
The sirex woodwasp is a species of horntail, native to Europe, Asia, and northern Africa. Adults vary in length from 9 to 36 mm.
The Ibaliidae are a small family of the hymenopteran superfamily Cynipoidea. Ibaliidae differ from most of the cynipoids by the larvae being parasitoids on other wasp larvae in the group Siricidae. The Ibaliidae comprise three extant genera of fairly large wasps, with a total of 20 species, and is a sister group to the rest of the cynipoids except the small subfamily Austrocynipidae.
Cotesia glomerata, the white butterfly parasite, is a small parasitoid wasp belonging to family Braconidae. It was described by Carl Linnaeus in his 1758 publication 10th edition of Systema Naturae.
Amylostereum is the single genus in the fungal family Amylostereaceae. The genus currently comprises four saprotrophic and parasitic species, which live off living or dead wood. The Amylostereaceae cause white rot in the wood by disintegrating the tissue component lignin. They produce crust-like, partially wavy fruit bodies on the surface of infested trees, which are similar to those produced by Stereum species.
Rhyssa is a genus of ichneumon wasps belonging to the family Ichneumonidae subfamily Rhyssinae.
Amblyteles armatorius is a species of parasitic wasp in the family Ichneumonidae first described by Johann Reinhold Forster in 1771.
Megarhyssa macrurus, also known as the long-tailed giant ichneumonid wasp or long-tailed giant ichneumon wasp, is a species of large ichneumon wasp. It is a parasitoid, notable for its extremely long ovipositor which it uses to deposit an egg into a tunnel in dead wood bored by its host, the larva of a similarly large species of horntail.
Leucospis dorsigera is a species of wasp belonging to the family Leucospidae.
Ibalia leucospoides, the knife-shaped ibalia, is a species of ibaliid wasp in the family Ibaliidae.
Therion circumflexum is a species of ichneumon wasp in the family Ichneumonidae.
Megischus is a genus of crown-wasps in the parasitoid family Stephanidae. There are over 90 species globally distributed throughout the Neotropical, Palearctic, Afrotropical, Oriental, Australasian, and Oceanian zoogeographical regions.
