Family : Braconidae Nees, 1812

Diagnosis

Forewing with more than 3 closed cells (in species associated with leafminers usually with more than 5 closed cells).
Antenna with more than 16 segments.
Costal cell absent.

Superfamily : Ichneumonoidea
There are only two families in the Ichneumonoidea (Ichneumonidae, Braconidae), and Braconidae is the only one with members which attack leafmining Agromyzidae.

Classification

Overview

The Braconidae is one of the largest families of wasps, and they are commonly collected in all geographic realms. Current estimates are that there are about 15,000 described species (Wharton, 1997b), which are divided into 43 subfamilies (Achterberg, C. van (1993). Species are parasitoids with a wide range of biology, however, the most common hosts are Lepidoptera, Coleoptera and Diptera, and the majority of species are larval parasitoids.
In terms of the leafminer parasitoids, the species which are known to attack leafminer parasitoids fall into two closely related subfamilies: Alysiinae and Opiinae. The alysiines are characterized by having exodont mandibles, and the tribe Dacnusini contains the species that are mainly parasitoids of leaf mining and stem mining flies in the families Agromyzidae, Ephydridae and Chloropidae. Opiines have normal mandibles, and species are solitary endoparasitoids of Diptera, predominantly Tephritidae and Agromyzidae.

Identification

Keys to subfamilies of Braconidae are provided by Achterberg, C. van (1993) for the world, and Sharkey (1997) for the New World.