40 
Psyche 
[March 
tree, which was selected because it is known to be very 
resistant to the attacks of termites. 
“May 12 and 13 the workers continued to visit the ripe 
banana in small numbers. I failed to excite the colony 
or to bring out any of the workers by pushing a straw 
into their nest entrances, by pounding on the pole or blow- 
ing into the cavity. On the evening of May 13 I decided to 
open the nest and therefore placed the pole on a large col- 
lecting canvas, filled the entrances with alcohol and care- 
fully split the wood. The four entrances were seen to 
unite to form a single funnel-like passage, which grew 
narrower towards the end of the pole and opened into the 
middle of the main nest-cavity. This was about five inches 
long and one and a quarter inches from the surface. The 
two ends of the cavity were rounded out and the wood 
around the excavated pithy center had been gnawed away 
to form several irregular galleries. The colony had evi- 
dently been nesting in these cavities for some time. The 
wood was green and solid. There were about 150 adult 
workers, their queen, male and a number of eggs and 
larvse.” 
These observations antedate and add materially to those 
of Dr. Kalshoven on G. kalshoveni cited in my first note. 1 
We may conclude from them that the colonies of Geso- 
myrmex are monometrotic, or possess a single mother 
queen, that they are not very populous and nest in sound 
wood. Like other lignicolous ants they probably take pos- 
session of the abandoned burrows of other insects and 
enlarge them by tunnelling in the wood as the colony grows. 
Dr. Chapman's observations show that the smaller and 
more numerous workers do most of the foraging, have a 
peculiar, jerky, zigzag gait and are very timid. He has 
not observed the guarding of the nest-entrances by the 
largest workers, though he seems to have seen workers sta- 
tioned just within the entrance gallery. 
^ote on Gesomyrmex. Psyche, 36, 1929, pp. 91, 92. 
