HYMENOPTERA. 643 



segments (Fig. 768). The queens and workers are armed 

 with a sting, and the pupae are 

 naked. The following will serve 

 to illustrate this family : 



The Red-ant, Monomoriu m phar- 

 aonis (M o n -o-mo'ri-um phar-a- 

 o'nis). The most troublesome of 

 all ants that live in this country 

 is a minute yellow species that P St*SStSfifi S 



frequently invades houses. Al- ^ front leg, enlarged. 



though this species is light yellow in color, it is commonly 

 known as the Red-ant. When these ants build their nests 

 within the walls or beneath the foundations of a house it is 

 almost impossible to dislodge them. By trapping and de- 

 stroying the workers their numbers can be lessened some- 

 what. But so long as the queens are undisturbed in their 

 nests the supply of workers will continue. 



The Shed-builder Ant, Cremastogaster lineolata (Cre-mas- 

 to-gas'ter lin-e-o-la'ta). This is a small ant, the workers 

 measuring from one eighth to three sixteenths inch in length. 

 It is usually yellowish brown, with a black abdomen ; but it 

 varies greatly in color. Its favorite nesting-place is under 

 stones or underneath and within the decayed matter of old 

 logs and stumps. Out of this material the ants sometimes 

 make a paper-like pulp with which they build a nest attaches 

 to the side of a log, or even to the branches of a shrub at som 

 distance from the ground. Professor Atkinson descri 

 such a nest,* which was built several feet from the groi , 

 on a bush, and was eighteen inches long and twelve in is 

 in circumference ; it contained about one fourth pin of 

 adults, pupae, and larvae, and was doubtless the horr of 

 the colony. But these ants often build small she* at 

 some distance from the nest, over the herds of Aphi ; or 

 scale-insects from which they obtain honey-dew. In hese 



*American Naturalist, Aug. 1887. 



