The Hymenoptera are a prominent component of the Entomology Collection, comprising perhaps 1/3 of the total holdings. The following groups are of special importance:
Formicidae
Arguably the finest in the world, the MCZ ant collection is an indispensable resource for the study of ant biodiversity and systematics. The collection contains about 1,000,000 pinned and labeled ants and is extremely rich in type material. In addition, there are several thousand vials of alcohol specimens and 704 vials containing the G.C. and J. Wheeler larvae collection, the largest existing collection of immature ants.
The collection was founded in 1908, when William Morton Wheeler came to Harvard from the American Museum of Natural History. It grew rapidly in size and importance, thanks to Wheeler and his students, until Wheeler's death in 1937. Wheeler described many new genera and species, and obtained many types from important European researchers, chiefly Forel, Emery, and Santschi. Thus, this collection holds an extraordinary number of type material that is of vital importance to modern generic revisions.
Beginning in 1948, Willian L. Brown Jr. and Edward O. Wilson added an enormous quantity of valuable material, resulting from their global collecting efforts and research in ant systematics. Ed Wilson has also assembled a large collection of ants from Miocene Dominican amber.
In 1987, an NSF collection improvement grant obtained by Ed Wilson funded a badly needed expansion of the collection space, provided room for future growth, and funds for curation. It was the beginning of a new era for the Formicidae collection. Since then, Stefan Cover has added almost 10,000 series of New World ants, and Gary Alpert has contributed 50,000 specimens collected in Madagascar, one of the least known ant faunas in the world. Major contributions have also been made by Barry Bolton and P.S. Ward. Additional noteworthy donations have been provided by Mark Deyrup, Lloyd Davis Jr., Robert Johnson, Mark Moffett, John Tobin, and William Mackay.
Current projects include Ed Wilson's ongoing revisions of the New World Pheidole, a group of 600+ species (and counting!). The ants of North America project is Stefan Cover's effort to revise and expand W.S. Creighton's classic Ants of North America (1950). Finally, Gary Alpert is engaged in a study of the ant fauna of Madagascar, and has assembled an enormous collection information database to support ongoing revisionary work.
Vespidae
The Vespid collection, originally the creation of Joseph Bequaert, is among the most complete in North America, especially in social wasps. Current holdings are estimated at 100,000 specimens. Important recent additions have been made by James Carpenter (now at the American Museum of Natural History) and John Wenzel (now at Ohio State University).
Sphecidae & Pompilidae
The Sphecid collection (about 85,000 wasps) was started by Nathan Banks and features abundant material added by Howard Ensign Evans. The Pompilid collections is probably the largest worldwide, after the Natural History Museum in London.
Ichneumondoidea
The collections of Ichneumonid and Braconid wasps contain an estimated 130,000 specimens. They are world-wide in scope, but have especially strong representation of New World forms. Both collections have been much improved and made more accessible to the researchers via the curation efforts of Scott Shaw (now at the University of Wyoming).
Bethylidae & Cynipidae
The Bethylidas feature an abundance of New World specimens contributed by H.E. Evans. The Cynipids feature type material and galls collected by Alfred Kinsey before he turned to the study of human sexual behavior.