Ants of Costa Rica: Pheidole Species List

Old name = New name
campanae = tennantae
decem = perpusilla
JTL-009 = brachyops
JTL-013 = hoelldobleri
JTL-021 = truncula
JTL-036 = glomericeps
JTL-040 = amabilis
JTL-044 = ulothrix
JTL-046 = dryas
JTL-048 = erratilis
JTL-050 = carinata
JTL-051 = erratilis
JTL-052 = cataphracta
JTL-054 = caulicola
JTL-066 = hector
JTL-068 = chocoensis
JTL-073 = mantilla
JTL-074 = violacea
JTL-077 = psilogaster
JTL-079 = laticornis
JTL-080 = potosiana
JTL-081 = vestita
JTL-083 = cerina
JTL-087 = renae
JTL-090 = lustrata
JTL-091 = arboricola
JTL-092 = lucaris
JTL-094 = daphne
JTL-095 = hizemops
JTL-097 = longinoi
JTL-099 = onyx
JTL-100 = boliviana
JTL-102 = beloceps
JTL-103 = prolixa
JTL-106 = arhuaca
JTL-111 = colobopsis
JTL-114 = scitula
JTL-115 = hizemops
JTL-116 = angulifera
JTL-118 = excubitor
JTL-119 = exarata
JTL-121 = perpusilla
JTL-127 = synarmata
JTL-128 = hazenae
JTL-145 = synarmata
pubiventris = variegata
praetorum = prattorum
radoszkowskii luteola = radoszkowskii
radoszkowskii pugnax = pugnax
sus = traini

There was early confusion in the names of two species: rectitrudis vs. erectitrudis and rectispina vs. erectispina. In Wilson (2003) they are rectitrudis and rectispina.

Comments on Wilson (2003)

Wilson aptly describes Pheidole as a "hyperdiverse" ant genus. Local communities in the Neotropics can contain over 70 species, and there is extensive geographic variation. There will be on-going assessment of whether this variation is inter- versus intra-specific, and thus Pheidole species names will undoubtedly remain unstable for a while.

The history of Pheidole taxonomy for Costa Rica begins with the early naturalists. Alfaro, Tristan, Biolley, and others collected in Costa Rica in the late 1800's and sent material to European taxonomists, mainly Emery and Forel. From about 1880 to 1920 Emery and Forel described many new species from this material, making Costa Rica the type locality for many Neotropical Pheidole species. Starting in the 1960's, Bill Brown, E. O. Wilson, and others began collecting ants in Costa Rica, accumulating material in collections at Harvard's Museum of Comparative Zoology (MCZ). Costa Rica subsequently became a mecca for students of tropical biology, attracting a large number of researchers, many of whom studied ants. During this time I became interested in the ant fauna of Costa Rica and began collecting and sorting Pheidole material. Meanwhile E. O. Wilson and Stefan Cover of the MCZ began an ambitious project to revise the Pheidole of the New World. In 1997 Stefan Cover and I collaborated to develop the Pheidole pages for the Ants of Costa Rica website. These pages used a combination of older published names, Wilson's unpublished manuscript names, and a series of morphospecies codes of the form "JTL-000." Wilson's revision was published in 2003 (Wilson, E. O. 2003. Pheidole in the New World: A Dominant, Hyperdiverse Ant Genus. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass).

There are inevitable differences of opinion in taxonomy, and below I attempt to outline some of the differences between the Pheidole taxonomy presented here and the taxonomy in Wilson's revision.

The following are potential synonyms (Junior syn. = senior syn.):
angusticeps = gradifer
iracunda = arachnion
chloe = striaticeps
ebenina = laselva
exigua = flavens
glyphoderma = arietans
grantae = exarata
humida = boltoni
indagatrix = obscurior
medialis = radoszkowskii
perdiligens = indistincta
petersoni = erratilis
piceonigra = indistincta
sagana = nitidicollis
texticeps = indistincta

Below are Wilson synonyms I disagree with:
innupta (synonymized under alfaroi)
anastasii (synonymized under bilimeki)

Page author: John T. Longino longinoj@evergreen.edu

Date of this version: 29 December 2008.

Previous versions of this page: 27 December 1997, 25 November 1998, 29 January 2001, 29 June 2003

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