////: HARVESTING ANTS. 



-75 



ments and arc very apt to stop motionless at the least alarm. Day or 

 night one or two of the workers may he seen on the outer surface of 

 the crater, scarcely moving unless molested, hut when distnrhed they 

 hurriedly retreat into the nest to spread the alarm. Their habits arc 

 rather nocturnal. If a light is brought near the nest when a worker 

 is on the point of leaving it with a grain of sand, she hurriedly backs 

 into the entrance and there stops, closing it perfectly with her burden. 

 It" the observer remains very <|uict, she eventually comes forth and 

 deposits her load on the slope of the crater. There are scarcely more 

 than thirty individuals in a nest. I have found this species only in a 

 very circumscribed area, south of Kairouan, on compact, sandy soil in 



Fir,. 157. Male, virgin female, and worker of tlu- Texan harvester. rt>gonom\rmc.\- 

 molefaciens, nearly twice natural size. (Original.) 



which the chambers are easily excavated." I <|iiotc this description at 

 length and reproduce Santschi's figure on account of the remarkable 

 resemblance of the O.ryopomynnc.r nest to those of the fungus-growing 

 Trachymyrmex to be described in the next chapter. The genus O.rvo- 

 /^innynnc.r is represented by several species, some of which have been 

 placed in a subgcmis, Goniomma. One of these, C. liispauica of south- 

 western Europe, is also a harvesting ant, according to Krn. .Andre 



To the old observations of Sykes and Jerdon on harvesting ants in 

 India, 'Wroughton (1892) has added accounts of the habits of ///- 

 comyrmex scabriceps ( I 7 ig. 150) and Pheidologeton occllifcr. Of the 

 former he says : " In a community of this genus there are workers of all 

 sizes. Holcomyrmex is, as a rule, a most industrious harvester, and 



