Apoidea

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Apoidea
Bee PD foto explained1.jpg
Apis mellifera, the western honeybee
Scientific classification
Kingdom:
Phylum:
Class:
Order:
Suborder:
Superfamily:
Apoidea
Subgroups

Spheciformes

Anthophila

Incertae sedis

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The superfamily Apoidea is a major group within the Hymenoptera, which includes two traditionally recognized lineages, the "sphecoid" wasps, and the bees. Molecular phylogeny demonstrates that the bees arose from within the Crabronidae, so that grouping is paraphyletic.

Nomenclature

Bees appear in recent classifications to be a specialized lineage of crabronid wasps that switched to the use of pollen and nectar as larval food, rather than insect prey; this makes the Crabronidae a paraphyletic group. Accordingly, bees and sphecoids are now all grouped together in a single superfamily, and the older available name is "Apoidea" rather than "Sphecoidea" (which, like Spheciformes, has been used in the past, but also defined a paraphyletic group and has been abandoned).

As bees (not including their wasp ancestors) are still considered a monophyletic group, they are given a grouping between superfamily and family to unify all bees, Anthophila.[1]

Phylogeny

This cladogram is based on Debevic et al 2012, which used molecular phylogeny to demonstrate that the bees (Anthophila) arose from deep within the Crabronidae, which is therefore paraphyletic. The Heterogynaidae are also broken up.[2] The small subfamily Mellininae was not included in their analysis.

Apoidea

Ampulicidae




"Heterogynaidae" (part)





Sphecidae (sensu stricto)



Crabroninae (part of "Crabronidae")



(rest of "Crabronidae")

Bembicini





Nyssonini, Astatinae



"Heterogynaidae" (part)





Pemphredoninae, Philanthinae



Anthophila (bees)








References

  1. Engel, M.S. (2005). Family-group names for bees (Hymenoptera: Apoidea). American Museum Novitates 3476: 1–33.
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Further reading

  • Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  • Michener, C.D. (2000). The Bees of the World. Johns Hopkins University Press.

External links