DONISTHORPEA. 195 



centimetres in height, thirty-six centimetres in breadth and twenty 

 centimetres in depth, and Zimmer 58 records the discovery of a nest 

 which was situated in a child's coffin which had been buried for 

 about thirty years, the entire interior of the coffin being filled with 

 the carton made by the ants. 



D. fuliginosa often deserts its nests, especially when they have 

 been disturbed, but on the other hand it often remains in the same 

 place for long periods. Bennett has known of a colony, nesting at 

 the foot of a large oak tree at Guestling, for over twenty years. 



The food of this ant consists very largely of the excreta of 

 Aphidae which it attends on trees, though it does not harbour 

 them in its nests, and it also visits Coccidae, hunts insects, feeds on 

 the frass of caterpillars, collects seeds, and raids the nests of other 

 ants, carrying off their pupae. 



Forel 22 says they attend plant lice on large trees, especially 

 oaks, and Escherich states they only visit the Aphidae that live on 

 the bark of trees 45 . 



Schenck 6 noticed that this species was very fond of a juice it 

 obtained from a Coccus on oak trees, Douglas 29 recorded that 

 Dr. Chapman observed it attending Lecanium rubi on bramble 

 stems near Hereford, and Sulc 32 found three females of Pseudo- 

 coccus aceris on detached pieces of bark in the runs of D. fuliginosa 

 at Prague, which were surrounded and caressed by the ants. 



Morley 37 records it devouring the larvae of Liparis salicis, and 

 carrying Hemerobius stigma in its jaws, and I have frequently 

 watched the workers returning home laden with small insects, 

 though by far the greater number have nothing in their jaws, but 

 their gasters are distended with liquid. 



Forel 22 saw a number of these ants returning home, each with a 

 pupa of a Myrmica in its mandibles, and he concluded they must 

 have raided a large Myrmica nest, and Wasmann 40 observed on 

 August 7th, 1898, at Lippspringe a strong colony of D. fuliginosa 

 marching over a distance of twenty metres to a nest of M . laevinodis, 

 and plundering and carrying home the larvae and pupae of the 

 latter. 



In spite of the fact that Gould never saw these ants carrying 

 grain, they do most certainly collect the seeds of plants. Lagerheim 

 has seen them carrying the seeds of Viola odorata, V. hirta, and 

 Melica uni flora in Scandinavia 41 , and in September, 1909, at 

 Darenth Wood I collected a number of the seeds of Melica uniflora 

 which I took from the workers of a colony of Z>. fuliginosa, as they 

 brought them to their nest, which was situated in a large tree 

 stump 52 . These seeds all belong to types which are attractive to 

 ants, by reason of the food stored in them. 



The marriage flight takes place in the early afternoon, but also 

 according to Huber 5 in the middle of the night, which accounts for 

 the fact that Morley took males at electric light in Ipswich 37 . 



