Deletion of the genus Aspicolpus Wesmael, 1838 from the British list, and a near-certain host for Vadumasonium vardyorum van Achterberg & Broad, 2013 (Hymenoptera: Braconidae, Brachistinae, Diospilini)

Abstract

• Errors of various kinds, including records of country occurrence and biological properties, that creep into the published entomological literature always cause problems because they are very difficult to expunge, even when it becomes clear from later experience that they really muse be errors. For species of parasitoid wasps these problems of misinformation are so great that they encourage the view that citations from the abstracted literature, especially on host associations (Shaw, 1994) but also of country occurrence (van Achtenberg & Shaw, 2016), are best simply set aside when reviewing the evidence for either, in favour of the direct evidence available to the authors themselves. In order to improve this rather dire state of affairs, or at least to curb it, it is important to try and correct errors (or suspect speculations) when they come to light, so that a careful assessment of the published literature will at least reveal the challenge. Two, related, cases are dealt with here.