Vespas sociais (Vespidae: Polistinae) em unidades de conservação do cerrado e da Caatinga, Minas Gerais, Brasil

The Grande Sertão Veredas National Park, north of Minas Gerais, located in the Cerrado, a global hotspot, lacks information about the community of social wasps, insects that perform numerous services for the functioning of ecosystems. Therefore, the objective of this study was to carry out an inventory of social wasps (Vespidae: Polistinae) in the Grande Sertão Veredas National Park, in addition to comparing their richness and composition with that of three other fully protected Conservation Units in the North and in the Jequitinhonha Valley in the state of Minas Gerais. Four collections were carried out, for six days each, in the months of September and November in the dry season, and in the months of February and April in the rainy season, within the park, with four researchers, totaling 144 hours of sampling effort per researcher. The wasps were collected using two methodologies: attractive traps and active search, and therefore, when captured, they were placed in tubes with 70% alcohol for later identification. 41 species of 14 genera of social wasps were recorded, with a new occurrence record for the state, Mischocyttarus campestris Raw, 1985. The presence of distinct communities of social wasps in the Conservation Units in the Cerrado and Caatinga, analyzed in the present study, reinforces and justifies the creation of these areas of full protection, which ensures the conservation of this biological heritage, as well as the environmental services provided by these taxa, in addition to providing subsidies for the sustainable management and use of natural resources in these Conservation Units.