The Phylogenetic System of the Gayellini (Hymenoptera: Vespidae; Masarinae)

The Gayellini is one of the two. tribes of Masarinae (Carpenter, 1981). Endemic to the Neotropics, the majority of the species are Patagonian, but one ranges as far north as Mexico. With ten described species, the group is far less speciose than its sister-tribe Masarini, which has over 200 described species (cf. Richards, 1962), and most species are rarely collected. These wasps have a very distinctive appearance among Vespidae (Fig. 1), and their taxonomic history has been more turbulent than any other higher vespid taxon. Although the phylogenetic placement of the group as a whole has now evidently been settled (Carpenter, 1981), no study has been made of the species. The current generic classification is fragmented, and there have been no keys to all of the taxa. In this paper, I investigate the phylogenetic relationships of the species, and present a revised generic classification along with keys to all taxa.