Meteoridea hutsoni (Nixon)

Hymenoptera: Ichneumonoidea: Braconidae: Meteorideinae: Meteorideini

Body slender, pale yellow or orange, often with a pinkish tinge, legs more or less completely pale yellowish; antennae slightly darker, brownish towards apex; ocellar triangle black; propodeum, first abdominal tergite and anterior portion of abdominal tergite 2 variable in colour from fuscous to dark brown or black, abdominal tergite 4 medially dark or fuscous; wings hyaline. Female antenna (Fig. 1) 30-segmented, first two segments wider, following segments distinctly longer than broad, terminal segment apically acutely produced into a slender point. Dorsal carinae of abdominal tergite 1 weakly developed or obsolescent; fourth and following abdominal tergites well exposed (Fig. 4). Vein 2-CU of hind wing situated far above level of vein 2A, near middle of vein cu-a (Fig. 3); marginal cell of fore wing normal, comparatively long. A arval-pupal parasitoid of coconut blackheaded caterpillar, Opisina arenosella Walker.

 Fig. 1
 Fig. 2
 Fig. 3
 Fig. 4

Note: Line drawings of diagnostic characters redrawn from van Achterberg (1993).

         Adult in dorsal view
   Adult in lateral view

South India: Karnataka; Kerala. China.

A relatively little known larval-pupal endoparasitoid of coconut blackheaded caterpillar, Opisina arenosella (Walker), not commonly collected. Ghosh & Abdurrahiman (1984) studied its biology. Total duration of life stages from egg to adult ranges from 17 to 23 days. Females live longer than males: with 50% honey, females lived for 12.4 days, whereas males lived for 9.3 days. In the field, males outnumber females, their ratio being 4:3. Meteoridea hutsoni was predominant during winter and showed perfect synchronization with high population of O. arenosella (Sujatha & Singh, 2004).