Camponotus oetkeri

Distribution
Found throughout WA and in the NT.

Distribution based on Regional Taxon Lists
Australasian Region: Australia.

Nomenclature

 *  oetkeri. Camponotus oetkeri Forel, 1910b: 75 (s.w.) AUSTRALIA. Combination in C. (Myrmogonia): Forel, 1913g: 191; in C. (Myrmophyma): Emery, 1925b: 112; in C. (Thlipsepinotus): Santschi, 1928e: 483. Current subspecies: nominal plus voltai.

Description
Worker Length 6.7-8 mm. Neighbor of the preceding specimen. Mandibles quite glossy, with dense large punctations, finely shagreen, armed with 5 (or perhaps 6) teeth. Worker major. Clypeus sub keeled, widely indented in the middle of the anterior border. Frontal ridges close together at the front but much less divergent than preceding. Eyes large, a little in front of the posterior third; frontal area rhombiform. Head oval, narrow in front, less narrow behind, deeply indented on its posterior border, sides very convex, almost as wide as long. Scapes exceed the occiput by more than a third of their length. 2nd and 3rd segments of the funiculus almost as long as the first and about 1 and 2/3 times longer than 9th and 10th, 3 and 1/2 times longer than thick. Thorax much more elongated than evae, never the less, apart from that the sharp border of the pronotum only extends along the anterior half of its sides. Node thick at the bottom, flat behind, sharp at the summit, the superior border is straight or sub indented. Under the petiole there is a small tooth directed backward. A range of small spines widely spaced on the tibias which are almost cylindrical, and sub compressed.

Subopaque, finely shagreen (wrinkled-reticulate). Punctation sparse, very faded and fine on the head, almost none elsewhere. No erect pilosity, except 3 or 4 hairs on the head; pubescence very diluted and very adpressed on the limbs, almost none elsewhere. Black; scapes and tarsi brown; tibias, mandibles and front of the head reddish. Coxa and femurs yellow. Worker minor (or media). The head longer than wide, less wide behind and with distinctly less convex sides compared with the major worker. But the posterior border is strongly concave. Clypeus with a keel,without indentation, with a light impression in front of the keel in the middle of the anterior border.

Tennants Creek, Central Australia. (Field)

References based on Global Ant Biodiversity Informatics

 * Heterick B. E. 2009. A guide to the ants of south-western Australia. Records of the Western Australian Museum Supplement 76: 1-206.