The first record of Bruchophagus sophorae (Hymenoptera: Eurytomidae) developing in seeds of Styphnolobium and Sophora (Fabaceae) in Turkey, France, and Kazakhstan

* Correspondence: ufensia@gmail.com The genus Styphnolobium Schott consists of 7–8 species of trees and shrubs, formerly included in the genus Sophora L. of the family Fabaceae (Sousa and Rudd, 1993). Some Sophora and Styphnolobium species are used in medicine, as they contain various bioactive ingredients, including alkaloids (Küçükboyaci et al., 2011). The Japanese pagoda tree, Styphnolobium japonicum (L.) Schott (or Chinese scholar tree, pagoda tree; syn. Sophora japonica L.), belonging to the family Fabaceae, is a common ornamental tree in Europe, North America, and South Africa, and it is widely distributed in Turkey, especially in Central Anatolia (Chamberlain, 1970; Sousa and Rudd, 1993). S. japonicum is a widely introduced woody plant with its origin in Southeast Asia (China, Korea, and introduced to Japan), and it is grown and cultivated around the world, especially in Europe (Kollar, 2012). The first record of S. japonicum in Europe was in 1747, and the first planting in Slovakia in 1840 (Machovec et al., 2000; Gregorova et al., 2004). The phytophagous chalcid wasp Bruchophagus sophorae Crosby & Crosby, 1929 (Hymenoptera, Eurytomidae) is a dangerous pest of the seeds of S. japonicum (Zerova, 1985; Zerova and Seregina, 1994; Noyes, 1998). For example, in Serbia the damage to seeds of S. japonicum was recorded as being from 2.88% up to 97.86%, the average damage was 50%–70% (Mihajlovich, 1983). The chalcid wasp B. sophorae has southeastern origins and has been described as being from China (Crosby and Crosby, 1929), but later this species has been widely recorded in Europe: Serbia (Mihajlovich, 1983), Slovakia (Grubik, 1992; Hrubik and Vookova, 1993), Bulgaria (Stojanova, 1997, 2004, 2007), Hungary (Erdos, 1960; Szelenyi, 1961), Romania (Popescu and Fusu, 2003), Germany (Rheinheimer and Hassler, 2013), Ukraine, and Georgia (Zemkova, 1980; Zerova and Seregina, 1994; Zerova, 1985, 1995). In Ukraine, the chalcid wasp B. sophorae was also recorded as developing in seeds of Cladrastis colutea (Michx.) C.Koch (Fabaceae) (Zemkova, 1980). Plants of C. colutea were introduced from North America into the Botanical Gardens in Ukraine (Kiev), together with plants of S. japonicum from Southeast Asia (Zerova, 1985; Zerova and Seregina, 1994). New records of the chalcid wasp B. sophorae from Turkey, France, and Kazakhstan are provided here. The material was studied under a Leica S8APO stereoscopic binocular microscope and microphotos were taken using Leica DMLB2 and Leica Z16APO microscopes. A Sony HDR-CX240E video camera was used for video recording. Mature seed pods of S. japonicum were collected in Ankara, Turkey, in November–December 2015. Observations of B. sophorae were undertaken under standard laboratory conditions (+25 °C room temperature) in June–July 2016 when they emerged from pods of S. japonicum. The identification of the species was conducted according to the identification keys in Zerova (1995). The material is deposited in the collection of the I. I. Schmalhausen Institute of Zoology in Kiev, Ukraine Abstract: The phytophagous chalcid wasp Bruchophagus sophorae (Hymenoptera: Chalcidoidea: Eurytomidae) is redescribed and illustrated. B. sophorae is recorded for the first time in Turkey and France, from seeds of Styphnolobium japonicum, and from Kazakhstan, from seeds of a new host plant, Sophora alopecuroides. New data on the biology, the stages of oviposition, and the distribution are given. Details of the oviposition of B. sophorae into the pods of S. japonicum are described for the first time.