Nomadinae is a subfamily of
bees in the family
Apidae
Apidae is the largest family within the superfamily Apoidea, containing at least 5700 species of bees. The family includes some of the most commonly seen bees, including bumblebees and honey bees, but also includes stingless bees (also used for ...
. They are known commonly as
cuckoo bees.
This subfamily is entirely
kleptoparasitic. They occur worldwide, and use many different types of bees as hosts. As parasites, they lack a pollen-carrying
scopa
(; ) is an Italian card game, and one of the three major national card games in Italy, the others being and . It is also popular in Argentina and Brazil, brought in by Italian diaspora, Italian immigrants, mostly in the variation. is also p ...
, and are often extraordinarily
wasp
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 ...
-like in appearance. All known species share the behavioral trait of females entering host nests when the host is absent, and inserting their eggs into the wall of the host cell; the
larva
A larva (; : larvae ) is a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before metamorphosis into their next life stage. Animals with indirect development such as insects, some arachnids, amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase ...
l parasite emerges later, after the cell has been closed by the host female, and kills the host larva. The first-
instar
An instar (, from the Latin '' īnstar'' 'form, likeness') is a developmental stage of arthropods, such as insects, which occurs between each moult (''ecdysis'') until sexual maturity is reached. Arthropods must shed the exoskeleton in order to ...
larvae of nomadines are specially adapted for this, and possess long
mandible
In jawed vertebrates, the mandible (from the Latin ''mandibula'', 'for chewing'), lower jaw, or jawbone is a bone that makes up the lowerand typically more mobilecomponent of the mouth (the upper jaw being known as the maxilla).
The jawbone i ...
s they use to kill the host larva, though these mandibles are lost as soon as the larva molts to the second instar, at which point it simply feeds on the pollen/nectar provisions. A behavioral habit shared by adults of various genera with males of many other bee species, who also do not possess a nest to return to, is that they frequently rest while grasping onto plant stems or leaves with only their mandibles.
Systematics
Tribes and genera include:
Nomadinae.
Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS)
*Tribe Ammobatini
**'' Ammobates''
**'' Chiasmognathus''
**'' Melanempis''
**'' Oreopasites''
**'' Parammobatodes''
**'' Pasites''
**'' Sphecodopsis''
**'' Spinopasites''
*Tribe Ammobatoidini
**'' Aethammobates''
**'' Ammobatoides''
**'' Holcopasites''
**'' Schmiedeknechtia''
*Tribe Brachynomadini
**'' Brachynomada''
**'' Kelita''
**'' Paranomada''
**'' Trichonomada''
**'' Triopasites''
*Tribe Caenoprosopidini
**'' Caenoprosopina''
**'' Caenoprosopis''
*Tribe Epeolini
**'' Doeringiella''
**'' Epeolus''
**'' Odyneropsis''
**'' Pseudepeolus''
**'' Rhinepeolus''
**'' Rhogepeolus''
**'' Thalestria''
**'' Triepeolus''
*Tribe Hexepeolini
**'' Hexepeolus''
*Tribe Neolarrini
**'' Biastes''
**'' Neolarra''
**'' Neopasites''
**'' Rhopalolemma''
**'' Schwarzia''
**''Townsendiella
''Townsendiella'' is a genus of cuckoo bees in the family Apidae, found in Mexico, and the southwestern United States.
Species
* ''Townsendiella californica'' Michener, 1936
* ''Townsendiella ensifera'' Orr and Griswold, 2015
* ''Townsendiella ...
''
*Tribe Nomadini
**'' Nomada''
Notes
References
* Michener, C. D. (2000). ''The Bees of the World'', Johns Hopkins University Press.
Brood parasites
Bee subfamilies
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