Megalomyrmex cupecuara

The type locality, Anchicaya, is described by Litte (1981) as “montane rain forest from 200 to 2000m, mean temperature 24°, anual rainfall ca. 2000mm, climate aseasonal”. (Brandão 1990)

Identification
Brandão (1990) - M. cupecuara can be readly distin­guished from all other species of Megalomyrmex by its transversally depressed propodeum.

Distribution based on Regional Taxon Lists
Neotropical Region: Colombia, Ecuador, Venezuela.

Biology
F. Fernández (IHVL) kindly loaned me the third known Colombian sample of M. cupecuara: 2 workers collected at Valle by R.F. Escalerete, 180 m, Bo(sque), August, 1995 [Usma & Aldaria, RSC-46].

Nomenclature

 *  cupecuara. Megalomyrmex cupecuara Brandão, 1990: 423, figs. 3, 11, 21-23 (w.m.) COLOMBIA.

Worker
Mandibles smooth; anterior border of clypeus round, without median denticle, carinae or me­dian depression; frontal suture impressed; ca. 13 ocular facets at eye largest diameter: occipital margin not raised; 3-segmented club; promeso­ notal suture impressed dorsally interrupting the dorsal profile; mesostern um and metastern um without acrotergites; dorsal face and declivity of propodeum meeting in lateral tubercles. which delimit a median longitudinal depression: dorsal face transversally depressed (in side view); de­clivity smooth; dorsal anterior margin of petiole concave; dorsal margin of petiolar node, in frontal view, round; ventral face of petiole with an­teromedian denticle, without flange; ventral process of postpetiole globose.

Pilosity: suberect  hairs  (length  from .2  to .5 mm) uniformly distributed over the entire body surface. Color: antennae and legs light-yellow. Body brown.

Male
First funicular segment larger than scape and other funicular segments; notaulus and  parapsi­dal sutures impressed (although some specimens may have these sutures faintly impressed); dorsal margin of propodeum transversally depressed: declivity smooth: epipetiolar carina complete; petiolar node globose; postpetiole  larger and lower than the petiole, without ventral process.

Type Material
Anchicaya. munic. Buenaventura. Depto. Valle del Cauca, Colombia (03°39'N, 76°56'W), holotype and 7 paratypes (3 workers, 4 males); 4Km E Sabaletos, Depto. Valle del Cauca, Colombia (03°48'N, 76°38'W). 1 paratype (male); Tinalandia, 16Km SE S. Domingo de los Colorados, prov. Pichincha, Ecuador (00°48'N, 76°38'W), 3 paratypes (male).

Holotype (worker). 2 paratypes (male) of Anchicaya and 1 paratype (male) from Tinalandia at Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard; 5 paratypes (3 workers and 2 males) from Anchicaya, 1 male from Sabaletos and 1 male from Tinalandia at Museu de Zoologia da USP; paratype (male) from Tinalandia at Facultad de Agronomia de Maracay, Venezuela.

The types from Anchicaya  have  been  collected by W. L. Brown Jr. between 17 and 19 of July in 1971. The specimens were found associated in pairs in each pin, a male and a worker, suggest­ing that they been collected in the same nest. The Museum of Comparative Zoology collection houses 12 more specimens from this sample (7 workers and 5 males). Males from Tinalandia, collected by the Peck couple in June, 1975 and a male from Sabaletos, collected by R. C. Wilkerson in October, 10, 1975, are distinctly larger than the Anchicaya males. The genitalia preparations. however, indicate that they are conspecific.

Etymology
cupecu­ara, cupe meaning a hole (in the sense of a de­pression) at the cuara- back (dorsum) in Tupi.