Adetomyrma

Adetomyrma is a genus of ants endemic to Madagascar. Workers of this genus are blind.[3] The type species Adetomyrma venatrix was described in 1994, with the genus being an atypical member of its tribe, the Amblyoponini. This tribe includes the Dracula ants, members of which can feed on the hemolymph of larvae and pupae.

Adetomyrma
A blind A. venatrix worker
A winged A. venatrix queen
Scientific classification
Kingdom:
Phylum:
Class:
Order:
Family:
Subfamily:
Tribe:
Genus:
Adetomyrma

Ward, 1994[1]
Type species
Adetomyrma venatrix
Diversity[2]
9 species

Taxonomy

Adetomyrma was first described as a Malagasy endemic monotypic genus by Ward in 1994. Ward (1994) assigned this genus to Amblyoponini within the subfamily Ponerinae on the basis of the worker morphology of the type species Adetomyrma venatrix. Later, Bolton (2003) raised this tribe to subfamily status as Amblyoponinae.[4][3]

Biology

The colonies, the first of which was found in a rotting log, may contain as many as 10,000 workers, winged males and several wingless queens (the majority of ant species feature winged queens). The workers use venom to stun their prey which are brought back to the colony for the larvae to feed upon. The colour of the winged males, a darker orange than the workers, suggests they disperse by flying to other colonies before mating.[1]

Known species

gollark: > zip bomb> malware
gollark: Also, production errors don't imply production errors which cause it to fail in specific and very harmful ways.
gollark: The very obvious issue with that is that getting COVID-19 and transmitting it is an externality.
gollark: Troubling.
gollark: As far as I'm aware the complications aren't anything beyond "you feel somewhat sore for a day", which is entirely expected.

References

  1. Ward, P. S. (1994). "Adetomyrma, an enigmatic new ant genus from Madagascar (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), and its implications for ant phylogeny" (PDF). Systematic Entomology. 19 (2): 159–175. doi:10.1111/j.1365-3113.1994.tb00585.x.
  2. Bolton, B. (2014). "Adetomyrma". AntCat. Retrieved 3 July 2014.
  3. Yoshimura, Masashi; Fisher, Brian L. (2012), "A revision of the Malagasy endemic genus Adetomyrma (Hymenoptera: Formicidae: Amblyoponinae)." (PDF), Zootaxa, 3341: 1–31
  4. Bolton, B. (2003), "Synopsis and classification of Formicidae.", Memoirs of the American Entomological Institute, 71: 1–370


This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.