Dolichoderinae, Formicidae, Hymenoptera, Insecta, Arthropoda, Animalia
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Range
Brazil (Par‡, type locality), Costa Rica. Costa Rica: La Selva Biological Station.
Identification
Color black with orange legs; mesosomal and gastral dorsum with abundant erect setae; scapes with very short, inconspicuous erect setae; femora and tibiae with abundant erect setae; dorsal and posterior faces of propodeum separated by a well-defined transverse flange; face and mesosomal dorsum foveate; pronotal humeri with acute spines; hind coxae with triangular dorsal tooth; posterodorsal petiolar apex with long acute tooth with broadly triangular base.
Natural History
This species is known from the holotype worker from Brazil and a series of workers collected from one of the Project ALAS canopy fogging samples (FOT/43), a Minquartia guianensis (Olacaceae) tree at La Selva Biological Station in Costa Rica.
Comments
Until now this species was known only from the holotype, a worker collected in Brazil, Par‡ State, Cachoeira do Breu, October 1928 (A. J. Sampaio). For a long time I was sure this was a new species, because it failed to key in MacKay's 1993 revision. In the key to species it first encounters difficulty at couplet six. The two choices are (1) petiolar scale produced apically as a long, needlelike spine, and (2) petiolar scale not produced apically as a long, needlelike spine, although it may be produced apically as a small spine. Dolichoderus setosus has a long spine but it is broad-based, not needlelike. If the first lug is chosen, the species keys to D. superaculus, to which it bears little resemblance. If the second lug is chosen it fails at couplet 8 because it has the anterolateral pronotal teeth and the shining anterior face of petiole characteristic of the debilis complex but the basidorsal teeth on the hind coxae typical of some members of the laminatus complex. In Kempf's 1959 key it more easily keys to setosus if one interprets the petiolar spine as a "sharply acuminate crest" rather than a spine.
Page author:
John T. Longino, The Evergreen State College, Olympia WA 98505 USA.longinoj@evergreen.edu
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