Myrmicaria brunnea

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Myrmicaria brunnea
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Formicidae
Subfamily: Myrmicinae
Tribe: Solenopsidini
Genus: Myrmicaria
Species: M. brunnea
Binomial name
Myrmicaria brunnea
Saunders, W.W., 1842

Myrmicaria brunnea casent0900498 p 1 high.jpg

Myrmicaria brunnea casent0900498 d 1 high.jpg

Specimen Labels

Subspecies

Myrmicaria brunnea and Myrmicaria vidua inhabit various habitats such as fruit gardens, sparse forests, forest edges and well-developed forests, and nest in soil, often building big mounds with soil particles. Workers scavenge dead animals and also tend homopterans. (Eguchi, Bui and Yamane 2011)

Identification

Distribution

Latitudinal Distribution Pattern

Latitudinal Range: 32.9141° to -6.78954°.

   
North
Temperate 		North
Subtropical 		Tropical South
Subtropical 		South
Temperate

Distribution based on Regional Taxon Lists

Oriental Region: Bangladesh, India (type locality), Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Vietnam.
Palaearctic Region: China.

Distribution based on AntMaps

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Distribution based on AntWeb specimens

Check data from AntWeb

Countries Occupied

Number of countries occupied by this species based on AntWiki Regional Taxon Lists. In general, fewer countries occupied indicates a narrower range, while more countries indicates a more widespread species.
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Estimated Abundance

Relative abundance based on number of AntMaps records per species (this species within the purple bar). Fewer records (to the left) indicates a less abundant/encountered species while more records (to the right) indicates more abundant/encountered species.
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Biology

Association with Other Organisms

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This species is a mutualist for the aphid Aphis gossypii (a trophobiont) (Lokeshwari et al., 2015; Saddiqui et al., 2019).

Castes

Images from AntWeb

Myrmicaria brunnea casent0900498 p 2 high.jpg
Holotype of Physatta gibbosa. Queen (alate/dealate). Specimen code casent0900498. Photographer Ryan Perry, uploaded by California Academy of Sciences. Owned by NHMUK, London, UK.
Myrmicaria brunnea casent0901426 d 1 high.jpgMyrmicaria brunnea casent0901426 h 1 high.jpgMyrmicaria brunnea casent0901426 p 1 high.jpgMyrmicaria brunnea casent0901426 l 1 high.jpg
Syntype of Heptacondylus subcarinatus. Worker. Specimen code casent0901426. Photographer Ryan Perry, uploaded by California Academy of Sciences. Owned by OUM, Oxford, UK.
Myrmicaria brunnea casent0908330 h 1 high.jpgMyrmicaria brunnea casent0908330 d 1 high.jpgMyrmicaria brunnea casent0908330 p 1 high.jpgMyrmicaria brunnea casent0908330 l 1 high.jpgMyrmicaria brunnea casent0908330 p 2 high.jpgMyrmicaria brunnea casent0908330 p 3 high.jpg
Syntype of Myrmicaria brunnea flava. Male (alate). Specimen code casent0908330. Photographer Will Ericson, uploaded by California Academy of Sciences. Owned by MHNG, Geneva, Switzerland.

Nomenclature

The following information is derived from Barry Bolton's Online Catalogue of the Ants of the World.

  • brunnea. Myrmicaria brunnea Saunders, W.W. 1842: 57, pl. 5, fig. 2 (m.) INDIA. Bingham, 1903: 118 (w.q.); Imai, Baroni Urbani, et al. 1984: 6 (k.). See also: Forel, 1903a: 708; Karavaiev, 1935a: 80. Current subspecies: nominal plus flava, subcarinata.

Description

Worker

Bingham (1903): Chestnut-brown, shining; mandibles finely and closely, head and thorax more or less widely, longitudinally striate; the nodes of the pedicel smooth or only slightly rugulose; abdomen polished and smooth; pilosity long, abundant, reddish yellow, slightly oblique ou the antennse and legs. For the rest the characters of the genus.

Length: 5.5 - 8 mm

Queen

Bingham (1903): Resembles the worker in colour; the mandibles are more coarsely striate, the clypeus is smooth, the front between the antennae and the cheeks longitudinally striate, the head posteriorly on the vertex and lateral angles coarsely reticulate. Thorax: the pronotum somewhat vaguely and transversely and the mesonotum posteriorly longitudinally striate; anteriorly the latter is smooth and polished, the scutellum rugose, the metanotum irregularly striate rugose, including the basal portion of the metanotal spines. Pedicel: the nodes rugulose, opaque; abdomen smooth, polished and shining. Wings hyaline ; nervures brownish.

Length: 12 - 13 mm

Male

Bingham (1903): Light chestnut-yellow, the apical margins of the abdominal segments more or less broadly brownish black; head and thorax somewhat densely pubescent, in places rugulose, giving them a dull subopaque black: head on each side of the ocelli longitudinally striate. Some few striae on the mesonotum posteriorly and on the basal portion of the metanotum, traces of the same on the apical face of the latter. Pedicel obscurely rugulose, sub opaque; abdomen smooth, shining, but not highly polished. Wings flavo-hyaline ; nervures yellowish.

Length: 10 - 11 mm


Karyotype

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  • 2n = 44, karyotype = 24M+20A (India) (Imai et al., 1984) (The photo is the Myrmicaria brunnea subcarinata).

References

References based on Global Ant Biodiversity Informatics

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