Volume //.] November, 1900. \No. 2. 



BIOLOGICAL BULLETIN. 



THE HABITS OF PONERA AND STIGMATOMMA. 1 



WILLIAM MORTON WHEELER. 



IN a recent number of the Biological Bulletin' 2 ' I described 

 the habits of three Texan ants belonging to the subfamily 

 Ponerinae. During the past summer an excellent opportunity 

 presented itself to extend these observations to two other 

 forms widely distributed in the Eastern and Northern States, 

 vis., Ponera coarctata Latr. and Stigmatomma pallipes Hald. 

 These are of no little interest to the student of ant life, the 

 former as a member of the typical genus, the latter as the only 

 known North American representative of the most primitive 

 tribe (Amblyoponii) of the subfamily. European myrmecolo- 

 gists have long wished to gain some knowledge of the habits 

 of P. coarctata, but its rare and local occurrence on their con- 

 tinent has rendered this impossible up to the present time. 

 The European type of the genus Stigmatomma, S. dcnticn- 

 latum Roger, is also rarely seen, and for the same reason its 

 habits are all but unknown. 



As both the ants to be considered in this paper are subter- 

 ranean and very timid, it is impossible to learn much about 

 them in their natural environment. It is therefore necessary 

 to keep them in artificial nests. This is, fortunately, an easy 

 matter, since the ants are very hardy. As the colonies are small, 

 it suffices to use for this purpose the Petri dishes employed by 



1 Contributions from the Zoological Laboratory of the University of Texas, No. 10. 



2 "A Study of some Texan Ponerinae," Biol. Bull. Vol. ii, No. i, pp. 1-31. 

 October, 1900. 



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