Hoplitis camelina (Benoist, 1934)
Hoplitis camelina was described by Benoist (1934) based on a female collected near Ain Leuh in Morocco. This female differs from European females of H. acuticornis (Dufour & Perris, 1840) by its yellowish-red rather than (yellowish-)white pilosity of head, mesosoma and metasoma and by the reddish rather than blackish marginal zones of the terga. Recently, T. Wood collected a series of females and males of H. camelina at the same locality and date near Guercif in southern Morocco, which show a strong variability in the colour of the body pilosity and the tergal marginal zones. Some specimens have a (yellowish-)white body pilosity and dark marginal tergal zones as in European specimens of H. acuticornis, whereas others have a yellowish-red body pilosity and lightened tergal marginal zones as in H. camelina and still others a (yellowish-)white body pilosity and lightened marginal tergal zones. As no structural differences between North African specimens of H. camelina and European specimens of H. acuticornis were found in either sex, the status of H. camelina as a species of its own does not seem to be justified. Therefore, H. camelina is newly regarded as conspecific with H. acuticornis. Pending a future revision of the H. acuticornis group, H. camelina is tentatively treated as a subspecies of H. acuticornis as proposed by Warncke (1991h).