A NEW DISCOTHYREA FROM NEW CALEDONIA 
(HYMENOPTERA: FORMICID^E) 
By William L. Brown, Jr. 
Biological Laboratories, Harvard University. 
I have recently received a small collection of ants made 
by Charles L. Remington on New Caledonia during the 
spring of 1945. Among them is a single specimen of 
a new species of the interesting genus Discothyrea Roger. 
This genus, hitherto unrepresented on the island, belongs 
to a group of relict genera occurring in New Zealand, 
Australia, the East Indies and the warmer parts of the 
Americas. The find would seem to further strengthen 
the belief in the Australia-New Caledonia-New Zealand 
land-connections hypothesized as existing in the past, and 
would also further indicate a past contact between these 
areas and South America. 
Discothyrea remingtoni new species 
Worker. Total length measured from anterior cly- 
peal border of the extended head to the posteriormost 
point on the curved surface of gastric segment II, 2.6 
mm. Length of head alone, 0.80 mm.; Weber’s length 
of thorax 0.73 mm. ; length of petiole, 0.19 mm. ; of gaster, 
measured around the curve of the vault to the anteriorly 
directed last segmental apex, 1.24 mm. 
Head from the front broadly oval, cephalic index 88; 
broadest at about the posterior third of its length, with 
the sides somewhat converging and only slightly convex 
anteriorly; the posterior corners broadly rounded and 
passing easily into the evenly convex posterior border. 
Seen from the side, the posterior corners are evenly 
rounded. The structure of the frontal region and car- 
inal plate much as in other Discothyrea species, the 
median ridge continuing upward to beyond the mid- 
length of the head. Clypeus moderately projecting, 
broadly rounded anteriorly. A* slight! area above each 
antennal insertion on each side of the carinal plate very 
weakly impressed. Mandibles short, strong, convex,. 
38 
