A wasp species previously known only from Bhutan has now been recorded in India, with researchers documenting it in Arunachal Pradesh’s Tawang district during a recent biodiversity survey.
The species, Antepipona bhutanensis, marks its first confirmed record from the country and points to possible faunal links across the eastern Himalayan landscape, according to a study published in Oriental Insects.
The research was conducted by Dibyajyoti Ghosh, Puthuvayi Girish Kumar, Atanu Naskar, Kumarapuram Apadodharanan Subramanian, and Dhriti Banerjee of the Zoological Survey of India and its regional centres.
The team carried out field surveys in Tawang between 2019 and 2022, covering multiple locations including Jang, Lumla, and Zemithang. Using a combination of pan trapping, transect walks, and sweep netting, they documented 19 species of vespid wasps across 10 genera.
The sampling focused on ecologically rich zones such as forest edges, riverine habitats, and agricultural landscapes—areas that provide nesting sites and floral resources for wasps.
The study notes that despite Arunachal Pradesh being part of the Eastern Himalaya biodiversity hotspot, data on wasp diversity in the state has remained “scattered and scanty” for over a century, largely due to limited systematic surveys.
Highlighting the broader importance of the findings, lead author Dibyajyoti Ghosh said the study marks “an important step towards understanding the hidden diversity of the Eastern Himalayas,” a region that remains underexplored for many insect groups.
He noted that documenting new distributional records, including a species new to India, not only expands faunal knowledge but also underscores the region’s biogeographic significance and the urgent need for systematic biodiversity documentation.
Apart from the new India record, the researchers also reported Polistes assamensis and Polistes santoshae as new records for Arunachal Pradesh, indicating gaps in earlier documentation.
An updated checklist compiled as part of the study places the state’s wasp diversity at 73 species across 27 genera and four subfamilies, reflecting a high level of taxonomic richness.
Among these, potter wasps (Eumeninae) emerged as the most species-rich group, followed by social paper wasps and hornets.
Field observations also recorded behavioural patterns, including wasps foraging on flowering plants, nesting in croplands and forest fringes, and, in some cases, preying on other insects. Hornets such as Vespa mandarinia were observed attacking honeybee colonies, highlighting their role as predators in the ecosystem.
The study underlines that wasps contribute significantly to ecosystem functioning—as natural pest controllers, incidental pollinators, and bioindicators of environmental change.
Emphasising the research gap, co-author Atanu Naskar said the findings help fill a major knowledge gap in the Eastern Himalayas and show that the region’s biodiversity “is still waiting to be discovered.”
Kumarapuram A. Subramanian added that the work provides a baseline for future taxonomic and ecological studies, with scope for integrating molecular tools, long-term monitoring, and ecological assessments to better understand species distributions and responses to environmental change.
Placing the findings in a wider conservation context, Dhriti Banerjee noted that while the Eastern Himalaya is a global biodiversity hotspot, many insect groups remain undiscovered, stressing that strengthening systematic surveys and engaging local communities will be key to conserving this hidden diversity.
The discovery of a species new to India, along with new state records, suggests that large parts of Arunachal Pradesh—especially districts like Tawang—remain underdocumented in terms of insect diversity, with further surveys likely to reveal more species.
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