Pheidole tepicana Pergande

Wilson, E. O., 2003, Pheidole in the New World. A dominant, hyperdiverse ant genus., Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press : 601

Pheidole tepicana Pergande

Pheidole tepicana Pergande 1896: 878. Syn.: Pheidole rugifrons Pergande 1896: 880, synonymy by Emery 1901 c: 119; Pheidole carbonaria Pergande 1896: 881, synonymy by Emery 1901c: 119; Pheidole kingi Andre 1898: 244, synonymy by Creighton and Gregg 1955: 24; Pheidole townsendi Andre 1898: 246; synonymy by Emery 1922c: 105; Pheidole kingi subsp. instabilis Emery 1901c: 120, synonymy by Creighton and Gregg 1955: 24; Pheidole kingi subsp. torpescens Wheeler 1915b: 404, synonymy by Creighton and Gregg 1955: 24. Raised to species level in this monograph: cavigenis .

Types Amer. Mus. Nat. Hist.; Nat. Mus. Nat. Hist. U. S.

Etymology Name based on type locality.

Diagnosis A member of the " pilifera complex" of the larger pilifera group; for a characterization of the complex, see under pilifera . P. tepicana is distinguished within the complex as follows. Trimorphic, with major, supermajor, and minor castes. Major: posterior half of dorsum of head except for occiput smooth and shiny; pronotum low and smoothly convex; mesonotal convexity very low; postpetiole from above diamond-shaped.

Supermajor: posterior third of head covered by a mixture of rugulae and rugoreticula; rugoreticulum present between eye and antennal fossa.

Minor: propodeal spines reduced to denticles; head almost entirely smooth and shiny.

Measurements (mm) Major (Austin, Texas): HW 1.12, HL 1.34, SL 0.62, EL 0.12, PW 0.54.

Supermajor (Guadalajara, Mexico): HW 1.62, HL 2.00, SL 0.74, EL 0.14, PW 0.74.

Minor (Austin, Texas): HW 0.52, HL 0.56, SL 0.52, EL 0.12, PW 0.32.

Color Major: reddish yellow.

Supermajor: light reddish brown.

Minor: brownish yellow.

Range Texas, Arizona southward to at least Jalisco, Mexico: often locally abundant.

Biology In the Santa Cruz Mountains of Arizona, Stefan Cover (unpublished notes) found a colony of tepicana in an open area with opuntia and dwarf acacia surrounded by blue oak, nesting under a stone in the sun; the nest contained a cache of seeds. The species is notably flexible in its choices of nest site. Near Tucson, Arizona, I observed a colony in an open grassy area, spread out beneath multiple stones. In western Texas, Moody and Francke (1982) found numerous colonies, nesting mostly under stones and in open soil; one colony each was also beneath a log, a piece of metal, and a grass clump respectively. And finally, at Cuernavaca, Wheeler (1901b) observed that colonies were common beneath pats of half-dried cow dung.

Figure Upper: major (plus partial frontal head view of a supermajor). Lower: minor. TEXAS: major and minor from Austin (syntypes of the synonymy kingi subsp. instabilis Emery ); supermajor from Guadalajara, Jalisco, Mexico. (Type locality: Tepic, Nayarit, collected by Eisen and Vaslit). Scale bars = 1 mm.