Leucophora Satellite Flies (Diptera: Anthomyiidae) as Nest Parasites of Sweat Bees (Hymenoptera: Halictidae) in the Neotropics

The biology of the 10 species of Leucophora (Diptera: Anthomyiidae) recorded in the Neotropics remains unknown. The large majority of the studied species so far are kleptoparasites of bees and wasps. Here, we report the first observations of Leucophora andicola (Bigot) and Leucophora peullae (Malloch) visiting the nests of ground-nesting sweat bees Corynura (Hymenoptera: Halictidae) in Chilean Patagonia. Females of both species perch on small stones or sticks within a dense nest aggregation of the bees and then track pollen-loaded bees in flight with great precision, eventually following them into their nests. The overall behavior closely resembles that observed for many other species of the genus. Excavations of some bee nests returned only two dipteran puparia, possibly of Leucophora, suggesting a low parasitism rate. One male of L. peullae was also collected at the bee aggregation. This is the first report of host association for any Leucophora from the Neotropics and the first report of any anthomyiid fly associated with augochlorine bees.