Dorylus

Hita Garcia, Wiesel and Fischer (2013) - The army ant genus Dorylus is mostly known for the spectacular swarm raids performed by some epigaeic species, mostly belonging to the subgenus Anomma, better known as "driver ants". These species perform huge swarm raids along the ground and lower vegetation with hundreds of thousands of blind, polymorphic workers to hunt down a great variety of prey taxa in large quantities, predominantly invertebrates (Gotwald, 1982, 1995). However, many more species within the genus live and hunt hypogaeicly and these army ants are generally less visible than their epigaeic relatives (Berghoff et al., 2002). Hypogaeic species hunt in columns and many species are known to be specialised predators of other social insects, such as termites or other ants (Darlington, 1985; Gotwald, 1982, 1995; Schöning & Moffett, 2007). Almost all species of Dorylus, like other army ant genera, live in monogynous colonies with dichthadiiform queens that have a massive egg-laying capacity, e.g. three to four million eggs per month in “driver ant” queens (Raignier & van Boven, 1955). In addition, Dorylus colonies migrate in irregular intervals to new nesting sites and new colonies emerge through colony fission (Gotwald, 1982, 1995).

Identification
Garcia, Wiesel and Fischer (2013) - The taxonomic condition of Dorylus, especially for the African continent, can be classified as chaotic and useless for identification purposes. On a global basis, 59 species and 68 subspecies are recognised (Bolton, 2012), although the taxonomic validity of many of these taxa is highly questionable. The problem is that most descriptions were based on a single caste, and careful examination of taxa in order to find evidence for conspecificity among these is very rare (Schöning et al., 2008). Also, no modern taxonomic revision is available, which dramatically increases the difficulties to identify Dorylus to species level. Nevertheless, identification to subgenus level can be well performed with the keys provided in Gotwald (1982).

Distribution
This genus is distributed throughout the Old World tropics and subtropics, but the majority of species are found in the Afrotropical zoogeographical region (Gotwald, 1982, 1995).

Species richness
Species richness by country based on regional taxon lists (countries with darker colours are more species-rich). View Data



Nomenclature

 *  DORYLUS [Dorylinae]
 * Dorylus Fabricius, 1793: 365. Type-species: Vespa helvola, by monotypy.
 * Currently recognised subgenera of Dorylus (alphabetical order with synonyms indicated): nominal plus  Alaopone (=Shuckardia), Anomma (= Sphegomyrmex), Dichthadia, Rhogmus, Typhlopone (= Cosmaecetes).