Morphological Caste Differences in Some Neotropical Swarm-founding Polistine Wasps : I. Apoica flavissima (Hymenoptera, Vespidae)

Apoica flavissima presents a distinct size dimorphism between queens (inseminated egg-layers) and workers (uninseminated, non-egg-layers). The measurements of 22 body parts and counts of hamulus number for a sample of 300 wasps showed that only three characters of the queens (n=5), i.e., apical height of the first gastral tergite, basal and apical widths of the second gastral tergite, were significantly larger than those of workers (n=295)(t-test, p<0.05). In most other characters, including number of hamuli, queens were smaller than workers. The basal width of the second gastral tergite was the determinant character. Other clear-cut intercaste differences were recognized in the color patterns of the frons, clypeus, mandibles and the first gastral tergite.