Abstract

Workers, soldiers, and gynes – morphometric characterization and description of the female castes of Camponotus singularis (Smith, 1858) (Hymenoptera, Formicidae)

Highlights

  • IntroductionWithin the eight recent genera of the tribe Camponotini (Blaimer et al 2015, Ward et al 2016), the worker caste is developed in a variety of forms, comprising species with monomorphic (e.g., Polyrhachis Smith, 1857; Dorow 1995), continuously polymorphic (e.g., some species of Camponotus Mayr, 1861; Wilson 1953, Busher et al 1985) and dimorphic workers (e.g., Colobopsis Mayr, 1861)

  • Within the eight recent genera of the tribe Camponotini (Blaimer et al 2015, Ward et al 2016), the worker caste is developed in a variety of forms, comprising species with monomorphic (e.g., Polyrhachis Smith, 1857; Dorow 1995), continuously polymorphic and dimorphic workers (e.g., Colobopsis Mayr, 1861)

  • No complete nest series were available for analysis, the observed relatively low number of majors compared to minors agrees well with the results of previous studies on other Camponotini: Walker and Stamps (1986) as well as Hasegawa (1997) examined two species of Colobopsis and found optimal caste ratios of soldiers to lie at around 20% of the total nest-population

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Summary

Introduction

Within the eight recent genera of the tribe Camponotini (Blaimer et al 2015, Ward et al 2016), the worker caste is developed in a variety of forms, comprising species with monomorphic (e.g., Polyrhachis Smith, 1857; Dorow 1995), continuously polymorphic (e.g., some species of Camponotus Mayr, 1861; Wilson 1953, Busher et al 1985) and dimorphic workers (e.g., Colobopsis Mayr, 1861). We present morphometric data on the Asian species Camponotus singularis (Smith, 1858), a large-­ bodied species with a wide distribution from Nepal to Borneo and Java (e.g., Smith 1858, Chapman and Capco 1951, Thapa 2000, Jaitrong and Nabhitabata 2005, Guénard and Dunn 2012, Bharti et al 2016) We have chosen this taxon, because it serves as an example of a species with a clear worker dimorphism, most apparently characterized by the size and shape of the head, and without the occurrence of intermediate phenotypes.

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