Aenictus weissi Santschi
Type location Congo (Santschi, 1910c: 354, illustrated,
worker; Santschi, 1920b: 9, queen) collected at Gomba, by A. Weiss;
worker and queen described  .
Santschi's (1910c) description of the worker is at
 ;
this seems likely to be a small morph and thus is more slender and has
narrow mandibles.
Also from Cameroun at Great Batanga, by G. Schwab (Wheeler,
1922).
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Aenictus species T¹
TL 4.54 mm, HL 0.76, HW 0.86, SL 0.59, PW 0.54
Colour dark orange-brown, legs and gaster lighter, mandibles very
dark, overall shiny and polished. Sculpturation of fine, faint
reticulation on the anterior pronotum, mesonotum, propodeum and
pedicel; overlaid with and partially replaced by fine longitudinal
rugae on parts of propodeum and mesonotum. Erect hairs long, fine and
abundant. Head widest at the anterior margin, with a distinct
occipital margin. The mandibles are massive, with the basal tooth
being a huge blunt lobe, the preapical tooth is moderate and the
apical tooth is large and slightly blunt. The clypeus has a bidentate
median process on the anterior margin. The position of the
promesonotal suture is faintly visible on some specimens. Propodeal
declivity marginate and concave in profile. The petiole is a flattened
dome, with the subpetiolar process trapezoidal, and the
subpostpetiolar process acutely triangular.
In Nigeria, I collected it from bare ground in a domestic
garden and from leaf litter in cocoa.
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The photomontage is collated from -
http://www.antweb.org/specimen.do?name=casent0406729
Collection details - Central African Republic: Prefecture
Sangha-Mbaéré; Parc National Dzanga-Ndoki, Mabéa
Bai, 21.4 km 53° NE Bayanga; 03°02'00"N 016°24'36"E;
510m . Collection codes: BLF4000 Date: 1-7 May 2001 Collected by:
B.L.Fisher. Method: EC19, sifted litter. Habitat: leaf mould, rotten
wood, in rainforest. Transect Type: MW 50 sample transect, 5m Transect
Sample No.: 2
This specimen is rather more heavily sculptured and more pilose than
weissi as described by Santschi but the overall morphology
seems a very close match.
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