Messor wasmanni (Krausse)
Type location Sardinia (Messor barbarus subsp.
wasmanni, Krausse, 1910: 524, worker; also Krausse, 1911:
15).
Bolton (1995: 258) has it as raised to species by
Casevitz-Weulersse (1990a: 154).
Krausse (1910) is a paper on stridulation and gives no taxonomic
information; his subsequent (1911) description is at
 .
Santschi (1927c: 24) keyed it out as having the first segment of
the gaster quite hairy (pileux), from Italy, Sardinia, Corsica &
Crete. His short text description (p 6) is - "head and gaster
brownish-black or black; alitrunk more or less dark red with the
upper pronotum and mesonotum brown; ; basal segment of the gaster
weakly pilous with several elongated "points"; slightly
smaller than the type (semirufus), the rest similar.
Casevitz-Weulersse (1990a) relates searching the National
Museum in Paris and finding the specimens separated by Santschi
for M. meridionalis and M. meridionalis wasmanni,
the latter being from Corsica. Having also sighted specimens from
Greece that matched the Corsican wasmanni, she judged the
form to be a readily separable distinct species. In her key the
closest species is the much smaller M. minor, TL 4.3-6 mm.
From that key the description of wasmanni now stands as
-
"[couplet 1'] Underside of head with several long hairs,
inclined anteriorly and weahly curved apically; translucent erect
hairs on the whole body. [couplet 3'] Head and gaster of a marked
brilliant black; alitrunk ferruginous red with large black
patches; pedicel segments black above and ferruginous red below; ;
some weak striations on the frons; several erect hairs on the
gaster, scarce on the whole body; TL maximum 9.5 mm.
The specimens shown below and on the attached page appear to
match the overall descriptions. The psammophore hairs are more
pronounced in the media specimens than in the major; this also has
a dark red rather than black head and more pronounced erect
pilosity. |
The polymorphism photomontage is of specimens collected in Italy,
at 10 km east of Brindisi, 40°38'28" N 17°50'28"
E, elev 34 m; 14.ix.1999, by David King. The individual
photomontages are on the linked