Body length 4.1 – 4.5 mm. Ovipositor length 3.9 – 4.2 mm. Gena rounded or with an obtuse angle posterolaterally. Longitudinal groove on interantennal prominence absent. Protuberances on occiput absent. Propodeum with carinae forming areolae, median areola not rounded anteriorly. Notauli well-impressed, with crenulae extending well along its length. Posterior margin of syntergum 2+3 straight. Median syntergite 2 + 3 weakly longitudinally rugose in anterior half to two-thirds, smooth posteriorly. Forewing clear except base slightly infuscate. Color as in Figs 3, 4. Color variation: Pale color of mesonotum may be more extensive or completely absent. Pale color of pronotum may be much reduced but always extensive on meso-and metapleuron. Pale color of hind femur varies from almost completely pale to almost completely melanic.

BOLD process ID/ Janzen parasitoid voucher/GenBank accession:

ASHYC4707-10/DHJPAR0037962/JN034688;

ASHYD1561-09/DHJPAR0036370/JN034687;

ASHYC4706-10/DHJPAR0037961/JN034686-

Guanacaste Province and Alajuela Province, Costa Rica. Click here for a distribution map.

All three rearings are from an unidentified Tortricidae of the same species feeding on rain forest Psidium guajava (Myrtaceae). Since this food plant is widely introduced into ACG pastures, it is assumed that the “natural” food plant of this caterpillar is some other plant and therefore the Lytopylus may be there as well. This tortricid lightly silks two overlapping leaves together and lives in a silk and fecal pellet tangle between them, while skeletonizing the leaf. Therefore, the wasp likely accesses the caterpillar by ovipositing through the leaf. This wasp and Lytopylus rebeccashapleyae are the only Lytopylus reared from more than 5,000 ACG tortricid rearings of dry forest and rain forest caterpillars. Austroearinus (Agathidinae) also has been reared in very low numbers from other species of tortricids than those that are Lytopylus hosts.

Lytopylus bradzlotnicki is named in honor of Brad Zlotnick of San Diego, California, who has enthusiastically supported the conservation of the ACG rain forest occupied by this parasitoid wasp.

Holotype: ♀, H6409 (DHJPAR0037961) Costa Rica: Guanacaste: Area de Conservación Guanacaste: Sector Pitilla: Estacion Pitilla: 7.ii.2010, 10.9893N, 85.4258W, 675m [AEI].

Paratypes [AEI, HIC, INBio]: Costa Rica: Alajuela: Area de Conservación Guanacaste: Sector Rincon Rainforest: Estacion Caribe: 26.v.2009, 10.9018N, 85.2749W, 415m: ♀, H7078 (DHJPAR0036370). Sector Pitilla: Estacion Pitilla: 7.ii.2010, 10.989N, 85.425W, 675m: ♀, H7071 (DHJPAR0037962). San Carlos: P.N. Arenal: Colada: 1.ii-iii.2000, 10.635N, 84.47W, 600m: ♀ H7081, ♀ H7070, ♀ H7073, ♀ H7072, ♀ H7069.