Messor creticus

An Alpine species recorded only form areas located above 1000 m. Nesting in soil, most often in humid, open areas, e.g., pastures or fields. Workers most active at nightfall, collecting seeds from ground or herbs. Colonies monogynous.

Identification
Messor creticus is most similar to Messor caducus and is easily distinguished from most of Mediterranean Messor in having mostly smooth and shiny head surface, more than 10 thick, erect setae on promesonotal dorsum, sparse and short erect setae on the first gastral tergite and presence of additional reticulation between striae covering surface of mesosoma. From M. caducus, it differs in lack of distinct psammophores. M. creticus has ventral head surface covered with long, thin setae that are only slightly curved on their upper part and do not form a shape characteristic for psammophores.

Distribution
Endemic to Crete.

Distribution based on type material
Greece.

Nomenclature

 * . Messor creticus'' Salata & Borowiec, 2019a: 58, figs. 9-12 (s.w.) GREECE (Crete I.).

Type Material

 * Holotype (w.): Collection L. Borowiec | Formicidae | LBC-GR00505 || GREECE W Crete, 1034 | Omalos Plateau | 35°20′N/23°53′E | 3 V 2011. L. Borowiec
 * Paratypes (22w., 1g.): the same locality as holotype (Natural History Museum of Crete, Heraklion, Greece).

Taxonomic Notes
This species was misidentified as Messor caducus by Borowiec and Salata, 2012: 512.

References based on Global Ant Biodiversity Informatics

 * Agosti, D. and C.A. Collingwood. 1987. A provisional list of the Balkan ants (Hym. Formicidae) and a key to the worker caste. I. Synonymic list. Mitteilungen der Schweizerischen Entomologischen Gesellschaft, 60: 51-62
 * Borowiec L. 2014. Catalogue of ants of Europe, the Mediterranean Basin and adjacent regions (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). Genus (Wroclaw) 25(1-2): 1-340.
 * Borowiec L., and S. Salata. 2012. Ants of Greece - Checklist, comments and new faunistic data (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). Genus 23(4): 461-563.
 * Czechowski W., A. Radchenko, W. Czechowska and K. Vepsäläinen. 2012. The ants of Poland with reference to the myrmecofauna of Europe. Fauna Poloniae 4. Warsaw: Natura Optima Dux Foundation, 1-496 pp
 * Salata S., and L. Borowiec. 2019. Preliminary contributions toward a revision of Greek Messor Forel, 1890 (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). Turkish Journal of Zoology 43: 52-67.