Formica nigricans BONDROIT, 1912

Formica pratensis var. nigricans BONDROIT, 1912 [photos of lectotype, zoogeography]

This is the first available use of Formica rufa pratensis var. nigricans EMERY, 1909 . EMERY (1909) reported as collecting sites “eine südliche Form; aus den Seealpen und aus Spanien, auch im Apennin (Vallombrosa)”. A lectotype was fixed in worker specimen stored in MHN Genève labelled “Cotypus”, “ Formica rufa pratensis var. nigricans Em Vallombrosa ” (C. Emery’s handwriting), “ v. nigricans Em ” (A. Forel’s handwriting), and “MHNG ENTO 00085011”. The characters revealed in the photos in combination with zoogeography clearly indicate that F. pratensis var. nigricans is a junior synonym of F. pratensis and not of Formica lugubris . The type locality Vallombrosa (43.73° N, 11.56° E, 950 m) is situated in a geographic region, as it is with the whole Apennine, where boreomontane species of the F. lugubris species complex did not occur in the times of C. Emery (BARONI URBANI 1971). All populations of boreomontane wood ants from the Apennine mountains known today go back to a massive artificial introduction performed during the years 1959 - 67 (e.g., PAVAN 1959).