Polistes rubiginosus is one of two species of red paper wasp found in the eastern United States (the other being Polistes carolina) and is noted for the coarser ridges on its propodeum. It is a social wasp (subfamily Polistinae) in the family Vespidae. Until taxonomic revision by Matthias Buck in 2012, P. rubiginosus was long known under the name P. perplexus. It occurs northernmost from Maryland, Pennsylvania to northern Ohio, south to Georgia, and from there west to central Illinois, Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas and Arizona.

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