Wasmannia sigmoidea

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Wasmannia sigmoidea
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Formicidae
Subfamily: Myrmicinae
Tribe: Attini
Genus: Wasmannia
Species: W. sigmoidea
Binomial name
Wasmannia sigmoidea
(Mayr, 1884)

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Specimen Labels

Longino & Fernández (2007) - The few Costa Rican records are as follows. David Olson collected workers during his study of Winkler and pitfall trap sampling methods at La Selva Biological Station (Olson 1991, as Wasmannia sp. 1). This was the only known collection from La Selva, in spite of intensive inventory effort there (Longino et al., 2002), until an August, 2004 collection of workers and alate queens from the rootball of a palm tree in the laboratory clearing. Workers occurred in four different samples from the Project ALAS expeditions to the 500 m site on the Barva Transect: two Malaise trap samples, one flight-intercept sample, and one sweep net sample. It is likely that sigmoidea prefers open and synanthropic habitats, hence its undersampling in Costa Rica, where sampling emphasis has been in forested habitats.

Identification

Wasmannia sigmoidea is the second oldest name in the genus and to date has been poorly characterized. It has never been satisfactorily differentiated from other species in the genus, particularly Wasmannia rochai. (Longino & Fernández 2007)

Keys including this Species

Distribution

Longino & Fernández (2007) - Kempf (1972) gives the range of sigmoidea as Guianas, Antilles St. Vincent, Grenada, and Santa Catarina state of Brazil. The Guianas are listed because of the type locality in French Guiana and some Surinam specimens he tentatively identified as sigmoidea (Kempf 1961). The St. Vincent record is based on Forel’s publication. We do not know the basis of the Grenada record. The Santa Catarina record is based on a published record by Mayr (1887), which is a misidentification of specimens of Wasmannia affinis. We have examined abundant material from Puerto Rico, multiple collections from Costa Rica, and a collection from Guarico state in Venezuela. Thus the current known range of sigmoidea is circumcaribbean.

Latitudinal Distribution Pattern

Latitudinal Range: 16.233° to -23.366667°.

 
North
Temperate
North
Subtropical
Tropical South
Subtropical
South
Temperate

Distribution based on Regional Taxon Lists

Neotropical Region: Brazil, French Guiana (type locality), Grenada, Guadeloupe, Guyana, Lesser Antilles, Puerto Rico, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname.

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 host for the eucharitid wasp Orasema minutissima (a parasite) (Mann, 1918; Heraty, 1994; Wetterer & Porter, 2003; Burks et al., 2018; Baker et al., 2019; Universal Chalcidoidea Database) (primary host).

Castes

Nomenclature

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

  • sigmoidea. Tetramorium sigmoideum Mayr, 1884: 13 (w.) FRENCH GUIANA. Forel, 1893g: 386 (q.m.). Combination in Wasmannia: Forel, 1893g: 386. See also: Longino & Fernández, 2007: 281.

Description

References

References based on Global Ant Biodiversity Informatics

  • Achury R., and A.V. Suarez. 2017. Richness and composition of ground-dwelling ants in tropical rainforest and surrounding landscapes in the Colombian Inter-Andean valley. Neotropical Entomology https://doi.org/10.1007/s13744-017-0565-4
  • Fernandes T. T., R. R. Silva, D. Rodrigues de Souza-Campana, O. Guilherme Morais da Silva, and M. Santina de Castro Morini. 2019. Winged ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) presence in twigs on the leaf litter of Atlantic Forest. Biota Neotropica 19(3): http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1676-0611-bn-2018-0694
  • Fernandes T. T., W. Dattilo, R. R. Silva, P. Luna, C. M. Oliveira, and M. Santina de Castro Morini. 2019. Ant occupation of twigs in the leaf litter of the Atlantic Forest: influence of the environment and external twig structure. Tropical Conservation Science 12: 1-9.
  • Fernández, F. and S. Sendoya. 2004. Lista de las hormigas neotropicales. Biota Colombiana Volume 5, Number 1.
  • Fichaux M., B. Bechade, J. Donald, A. Weyna, J. H. C. Delabie, J. Murienne, C. Baraloto, and J. Orivel. 2019. Habitats shape taxonomic and functional composition of Neotropical ant assemblages. Oecologia 189(2): 501-513.
  • Forel A. 1897. Quelques Formicides de l'Antille de Grenada récoltés par M. H. H. Smith. Transactions of the Entomological Society of London. 1897: 297-300.
  • Franco W., N. Ladino, J. H. C. Delabie, A. Dejean, J. Orivel, M. Fichaux, S. Groc, M. Leponce, and R. M. Feitosa. 2019. First checklist of the ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) of French Guiana. Zootaxa 4674(5): 509-543.
  • Galkowski C. 2016. New data on the ants from the Guadeloupe (Hymenoptera, Formicidae). Bull. Soc. Linn. Bordeaux 151, 44(1): 25-36.
  • Kempf, W.W. 1972. Catalago abreviado das formigas da regiao Neotropical (Hym. Formicidae) Studia Entomologica 15(1-4).
  • Kusnezov N. 1952. El género Wasmannia en la Argentina (Hymenoptera, Formicidae). Acta Zoologica Lilloana 10: 173-182.
  • Longino J. T. and Fernández, F. 2007. Taxonomic review of the genus Wasmannia. Memoirs of the American Entomological Institute 80: 271-289
  • Medeiros Macedo L. P., E. B. Filho, amd J. H. C. Delabie. 2011. Epigean ant communities in Atlantic Forest remnants of São Paulo: a comparative study using the guild concept. Revista Brasileira de Entomologia 55(1): 75–78.
  • Radoszkowsky O. 1884. Fourmis de Cayenne Française. Trudy Russkago Entomologicheskago Obshchestva 18: 30-39.
  • Rosa da Silva R. 1999. Formigas (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) do oeste de Santa Catarina: historico das coletas e lista atualizada das especies do Estado de Santa Catarina. Biotemas 12(2): 75-100.
  • Torres, Juan A. and Roy R. Snelling. 1997. Biogeography of Puerto Rican ants: a non-equilibrium case?. Biodiversity and Conservation 6:1103-1121.
  • Wheeler W. M. 1905. The ants of the Bahamas, with a list of the known West Indian species. Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 21: 79-135.
  • Wheeler, William Morton. 1911. Ants Collected in Grenada, W.I. by Mr. C. T. Brues. Bulletin of the Museum of Comparitive Zoology at Harvard College. 54(5):166-172.