Flower power

Members of the plant family Asteraceae (composites) were sampled from several localities, primarily in Texas, to examine the parasitoid community associated with flower and stem-infesting Tephritidae. Chalcidoids, primarily in the families Pteromalidae and Eurytomidae, are commonly reported from flower-infesting and stem-galling Tephritidae. Braconidae, commonly reared from fruit-infesting Tephritidae, are rarely found attacking tephritids in stems or flower heads in the Nearctic Region and our result confirm this. We compare our results with samples of parasitoids reared from flower and stem galling tephritids previously reared by Norrbom from the northern Neotropical Region.