Asphinctopone lucidus Weber
Type location Central
African Republic (Weber, 1949b: 7, illustrated, worker); worker
only described (see Bolton, 1995, who spells it as lucida) - no images on Antweb (at June 2014) .
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Weber's
description (1949b) is at . WORKER (updated by me): Extended length
3.5 mm; of thorax (including neck) 1.1 mm. Head in front view,
excluding mandibles, one and one-fifth times longer than broad,
occipital margin feebly convex, corners broadly rounded, sides feebly
convex; clypeus with a median carina which projects slightly over the
anterior margin, the latter otherwise slightly concave medially and
produced laterally on each side as an obtuse angle which projects over
the cutting margin of the mandibles; frontal lobes fused, flat, short,
and convex; eyes about 0.04 mm. in diameter, situated at the sides
about four of their diameters from the base of the mandibles; mandibles
narrow, triangular, evenly convex on their lateral margins, with five
or six teeth exposed beyond the clypeal lobe; antennal scapes
distinctly exceeding occipital angles, slender, slightly enlarged
distally, slightly longer than the funiculus to the terminal segment,
funiculus with three-segmented club equal in length to the preceding
seven taken together. Thorax from above with well-developed neck,
behind which the pronotum rises as an even convexity and is broader
than the remainder of the thorax: mesonotum small and transversely
elliptical, well marked from the pronotum and propodeum: metanotal
groove deep, propodeum with sides flattish and converging up to the
basal surface, declivity plane and marginate at the side; thorax in
side view forming one general arc interrupted by promesonotal and a
much deeper metanotal impression, the propdeum declivity surface being
flattened. Petiolar node high and scale-like, in side view with sides
converging to a narrow, convex apex; viewed from in front the scale has
convex sides broadest above the middle and a slightly angulate convex
apex. Gaster from above elongate-ovate, evenly convex anteriorly first
and second segments approximately equal in length and forming about
two-thirds of the gaster; sting of moderate dimensions and exserted.
Legs long and slender, of moderate proportions.
Shining; head densely and finely, thorax and especially propodeum more
sparsely but coarsely, gaster and appendages except mandibles finely
punctate; mandibles with a few piligerous punctures. Hairs largely
absent except for a dense yellow tuft at the apex of the gaster;
pubescence moderately fine and dense, especially on the antennae and
legs, but sparsely on the gaster.
Uniformly bright ferruginous.
HOLOTYPE: One worker taken March l2, 1948, 5 miles west of Bangassou,
Ubangi-Shari, French Equatorial Africa. The ant was in well-developed
gallery forest extending up a watercourse from the Mbomu River and was
beneath damp leaves on the forest floor.
The genotype, A. silvestrii Santschi, described from Nigeria in
1914, differs distinctly in having antennal scapes failing to reach the
occiput, the propodeum more steeply declivitous, the petiolar scale
thicker, and in other ways.
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