Pheidole

A pheidologist and his exploration of a hyperdiverse myrmicine clade

  • Queens and alates in Pheidole megacephala

    I was fortunate enough to stumble on an emigration column of Pheidole megacephala. A long line of the ants were moving from one part of their territory to another part about 20 m away. In addition to the workers carrying larvae, pupae, and egg masses, I saw larger forms running along besides their more nimble…

  • Pheidole flavens: Orangey Townie

    I found a tiny (soldiers 2 mm length) Pheidole species living in the greened middle islands of a central Florida town’s downtown, and at first I thought it was Pheidole parva. But after looking at macro shots of the workers and soldiers, I had to admit that they were not that species, and I tentatively…

  • Pheidole obscurithorax and Pheidole parva: Let the Big Girls Play

    Pheidole obscurithorax is the largest Pheidole species in Florida, whereas Pheidole parva is one of the smaller exotic species that is new to the area. Whereas the majors of P. obscurithorax can have total lengths of more than 6 mm and head widths of more than 1.7 mm, the tinier P. parva majors have head…

  • Drunken Camponotus

    I can’t figure out these Carpenter Ants (Camponotus floridanus?). They are much larger than the Pheidole megacephala minors and majors, and could probably avoid them altogether or run right through their foraging lines. But in at least three instances that happened over the span of three days, the giants tried to fight and ended up…

  • Behavioral dominance vs Numerical Dominance vs Ecological Dominance

    During my readings on ant behavior, there were some terms that cropped up that I was not quite sure about. Unfortunately, most of the papers seemed to assume reader familiarity with them, but my background is not ecology, so I had to search for some clarification. In the interest of perhaps helping those who also…

  • Some notes on combat behavior of Pheidole megacephala

    I have been monitoring and studying a small Pheidole megacephala cluster the last month, and during that time was present during three instances of direct aggression between it and another species. I will add here a few notes on what I have observed during those three instances. (1) The main tactic of PM is one…