1905.] Wheeler, Ants of the Genus Liometopum. 3^7 



nests of a Liometopum colony with one another, there are other very 

 long files which radiate out in different directions. These Emery 

 calls "predatory or hunting files." He describes the huge males and 

 females preparing for their nuptial flight on a July evening. The 

 wings of the females are very easily detached. These insects were 

 never seen to take flight voluntarily and when precipitated into the 

 air from the tip of the finger, they flew horizontally like termites and 

 permitted themselves to drift with the wind. He believes that 

 mating must take place on the trees during the twilight hours and 

 that the lumbering females take flight from the highest twigs. He 

 is also of the opinion that Liometopum. is an ant of which the female 

 is gradually losing the power of flight. 



Forel had occasion to study L. microcephalum in Bulgaria ^ and 

 was able to confirm many of Mayr's and Emery's observations: 

 "Liometopum-, as a rule, forms enormous colonies which often extend 

 over several trees connected by files of ants going back and forth. 

 In an old oak forest near Aetos (comprising the largest and most 

 beautiful oaks I have ever seen) I found a Liometopum- colony which 

 covered twelve huge nests. In order to ascertain whether the Lio- 

 m-etopum- on some more distant oaks were also members of this same 

 colony, I brought workers from the two places together. Those 

 from the more distant oaks were attacked and pulled about, not very 

 seriously, but with sufficient vehemence to prove that they belonged 

 to another colony. I found Liometopum colonies on oaks, poplars, 

 willows, apricot trees (which are often very large in eastern Rumelia), 

 and elms. 



"The nest entrances are often found in spots on the tree-trunks 

 where the bark is defective, or in dead branches, but also quite as 

 frequently in very hard wood, so that it is very difficult to obtain a 

 piece of the nest. In Sliven, nevertheless, I succeeded in sawing off 

 and carrying home a dead branch inhabited by Liometopum. It 

 certainly looks as if only the borings of beetles had been used; but 

 the cavities are in all probability enlarged by the ants. 



"Liometopum is a fiercely pugnacious ant and angrily attacks and 

 bites the intruder. At the same time it emits (evidently from its 

 anal glands) a secretion which Emery has described as intensely 

 aromatic arid very similar to that of Tapinoma erraticum-. As soon, 

 however, as the first odor has evaporated, another penetrating and 

 more disagreeable odor, which recalls that of Lasius emarginatus, 



* Die Ameisenfanna Bulgariens. Verhandl. k. k. zool. bot. Gesell. Wien, 1802. pp. ^os-^iS. 

 Taf. V. 



