Messor ebeninus

At Rawdhat Khorim, Saudi Arabia, worker activity has two peaks of abundance, in April and December, decreasing from July through October (Sharaf et al., 2013). Pashaei Rad et al. (2018) found this species in Iran on parkland ground in a moderate rainfall area.

Identification
Collingwood and Agosti (1996) - HW 2.0-2.5; EL/HW 0.19-0.23. This evenly black species has a rather variable pilosity with 1-5 hairs at each side on the occiput, 1-2 pairs on the propodeum, one pair each on the petiole and postpetiole and there are a few occasional hairs on the first gastral tergite.

Distribution based on Regional Taxon Lists
Afrotropical Region: Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates. Palaearctic Region: Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Kuwait, Lebanon, Montenegro, Oman, Turkey.

This species is known to occur in the Middle East (Abdul-Rassoul et al. 2013) and is widely distributed throughout the Arabian Peninsula (Collingwood, 1985, Collingwood and Agosti, 1996) (Sharaf et al., 2013).

Nomenclature

 *  ebeninus. Messor semirufus var. ebeninus Santschi, 1927c: 229 (w.) LEBANON. [First available use of Messor barbarus subsp. semirufus var. ebenina Forel, 1910a: 10; unavailable name.] Finzi, 1936: 160 (q.). Raised to species: Tohmé, G. 1971: 569. Junior synonym of semirufus: Baroni Urbani, 1974: 227. Revived from synonymy: Tohmé, G. & Tohmé, H. 1981: 142; Collingwood, 1985: 249. See also: Tohmé, G. 1975: 171.

Type Material
Salata & Borowiec (2019): syntype (w.): Messor | barbarus L. | subsp. semirufus Andr. | v. ebenina | type | Forel || Typus || Djebel Kasioun | Antiliban (Kerville) || Coll. | A. Forel || ANTWEB | CASENT0907734 (MHNG).