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| Cotesia ginginensis Fagan-Jeffries & Davies, in Fagan-Jeffries, Davies et Howe, 2025. |
Cotesia Cameron, 1891 is the third largest genus of the braconid subfamily Microgastrinae, both in terms of described species (>320 worldwide) and estimated true diversity (1500+ species) (Fernández-Triana et al. 2020). The genus is cosmopolitan and has a broad host range, with 30 different families of lepidoptera recorded as hosts, and with many species acting as important biological control agents of pest lepidopterans (Fernández-Triana et al. 2020). The Australian Cotesia fauna was recently reviewed; there are 22 species currently known from the country, including several species introduced for biological control (Fagan-Jeffries et al. 2024; Fagan-Jeffries & Austin 2020).
Whilst there are likely to be many undescribed species of Cotesia in Australia and surrounding regions, we take the opportunity to add a single new species to the list of named biodiversity that was collected as part of a citizen science project, Insect Investigators. This citizen science project (insectinvestigators.com.au) ran in 2022 and involved 50 regional schools in Queensland, South Australia, and western Australia (Howe et al. 2025; insectinvestigators.com.au). Students and teachers ran Malaise traps on or near their school property, the samples were sorted and DNA barcoded, and a selection of specimens were sent to taxonomists to identify or include in current taxonomic projects. Two Queensland schools, gin gin State High School and Prospect Creek State School, each caught a single female specimen of a species in the genus Cotesia. Students and teachers at gin gin State High School collaborated with the authors to name the new species in 2023, and we here formally describe the species and raise the number of Cotesia from Australia to twenty-three.
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| Cotesia ginginensis; holotype. A. lateral habitus B. fore wing C. dorsal head D. dorsal habitus E. anterior head F. T1 g. metanotum and propodeum. |
BRACONIDAE Latreille, 1829
MICROGASTRINAE Foerster, 1862
Cotesia ginginensis Fagan-Jeffries & Davies, sp. nov.
Diagnosis. Cotesia ginginensis can be separated from all other species of Cotesia currently described from Australia and Papua New guinea by the following combination of characters: mesosoma not dorsal-ventrally flattened (i.e., not as in Cotesia nonagriae (olliff, 1893)); fore wing r vein clearly longer than 2rS (r length >1.4 × length of 2rS); centre of the medial band of the mesoscutellar disc smooth; propodeum strongly sculptured with the medial carina clearly distinct for the whole length; T1 slightly broadening posteriorly but not strongly wedge-shaped (i.e., not as in C. ruficrus (Haliday, 1834)); T2 not strongly sculptured and T3 not densely setose (i.e., not as in C. rubecula (Marshall, 1885)).
Eeinn P. FAGAN-JEFFRIES, Emily DAVIES and Andy G. HOWE. 2025. Cotesia ginginensis sp. nov., A New Species of parasitoid wasp (Braconidae: Microgastrinae) from Queensland, Australia. Zootaxa. 5660(2); 293-296. DOI: doi.org/10.11646/zootaxa.5660.2.11 [2025-07-09]
