PSYCHE 
Nos. 1-2 
Vol. 66 March-June, 1959 
THE HABITS OF PHE 1 DOLE MILITICIDA WHEELER 
(HYMENOPTERA: FORMICIDAE) 1 
By Wm. S. Creighton and Martha P. Creighton 
Department of Biology, City College, New York. 
During the winter of 1959 the writers were able to study a num- 
ber of nests of Pheidole militicida Wh. These were situated in an 
area along the eastern base of the Chiricahua Mountains, six to nine 
miles north of Portal, Arizona. Extended field studies were made 
on these colonies and samples taken from them were placed in small 
Janet nests and observed at the Southwestern Research Station. The 
need for such work will be clear to anyone familiar with W. M. 
Wheeler’s remarkable views on the habits of militicida. 
Wheeler’s initial acquaintance with this ant was made on Novem- 
ber 10th, 1910, at Benson, Arizona. A day or two later he found 
other colonies at Hereford. If Wheeler’s hypothesis on the habits 
of this species is to be appreciated properly, it is important to under- 
stand exactly what information he secured from these colonies. Be- 
fore he excavated them, Wheeler found the remains of numerous 
majors on some of the chaff piles. The material in the Wheeler Col- 
lection indicates that these remains consisted largely of head capsules 
which lacked all appendages. If Wheeler had found living majors 
in the nests that he excavated, these disarticulated remains would have 
received scant attention. Unfortunately, Wheeler did not find living 
majors in the colonies which he dug out. But it should be remem- 
bered that after Wheeler had examined the nests at Benson and 
Hereford, he knew surprisingly little about the ants that were living 
in them. He could not even be sure that the majors, whose remains 
he had discovered on the chaff piles, had come from the nests where 
he found them. All that Wheeler knew was that he had taken the 
minor of an undescribed species of Pheidole from these nests and that, 
after considerable digging, he had been unable to secure any accom- 
panying majors. 
Contribution from the Southwestern Research Station of the American 
Museum of Natural History. 
I 
