but will look at specimens again tomorrow morning. Either way is interesting since they appeared this year in my garden.
Update (10/03/2014): looked at both of my specimens this morning. Being a skeptic I was ready for seeing white hairs at least on some parts of the body. Both specimens have basically black hair, on head, thorax, propodeum, petiole, ventrally on some sterna.
They don't look anywhere close to apicalis which does have white hair pretty much in all the places I saw black hair on my wasps. The whitish appearance in my photo must be reflection of the light from the flash I used.
I measured length of the two male specimens at 21 mm and 19.5 mm respectively.
Interestingly, one of the males has a broader head at 5 mm width, whereas the other one's head is only slightly less than 4 mm wide. Minor male, as found in some beetles?Update, Oct. 9, 2014: checked my two male specimens, with Doug Yanega's help, against identified specimens at U.C. Riverside. They're both I. philadelphica. I'll exchange this image for one that shows the black hair somewhat better. I'll try to refrain from using flash in certain settings. Will wait to move back to species until I have time to put in the other image. - Unfortunately, I don't have another photo of this specimen that shows the black hair better.