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Psyche 
[Vol. 90 
Discussion 
Repeated (and continuing) attempts to find P. colei or P. 
anergismus around Boulder City, NV, or Globe, AZ, where a single 
P. colei male has been collected (Snelling 1981) have yet to be 
successful. Nonetheless, observations of P. colei from the type nest 
in Boulder City provide insight into several questions of general 
inquiline biology including possible method of inquiline entry into 
host colonies and fate of host queen. 
Inquiline entry into host colonies. Newly mated P. colei queens are 
accepted into 1 week old workerless host nests in the laboratory, 
while they appear incapable of entering established host nests in the 
field (see above). Similar observations have been made in laboratory 
experiments with the inquiline Plagiolepis xene and its host, 
Plagiolepis pygmaea (Passera 1964). This suggests that at least some 
inquiline species enter a host colony at the founding stage prior to 
production of any workers. That this may occur in the field is 
supported by discovery of a workerless inquiline queen {Strumi- 
genys xenos) in an incipient host colony containing one queen, 
brood and a single worker of Strumigenys perplexa (Brown 1955). 
If entry into host colony commonly occurs at host colony 
foundation in some species of inquilines, overlap with host species 
flight season would be advantageous. Since all nests of a given 
species in a locality tend to have a longer “flight season” than any 
single nest (e.g. for P. rugosus see Holldobler 1976), the inquiline 
might further be expected to lengthen its flight season relative to 
that of its host colony to take advantage of the entire flight season 
and availability of founding nests in its locality. The extended flight 
season of P. colei relative to that of P. rugosus may occur for these 
reasons. Similarly, occurrence of P. anergismus reproductives dur- 
ing mid September in the type nest reported by Cole (1954, 1968) 
may also indicate inquiline-host reproductive overlap. 
Fate of host queens. Simultaneous production of host and inquiline 
reproductives during the 1978 flight (Table 1) strongly suggests 
coexistence of host and inquiline queen(s) at that time. Continuing 
existence of the host colony until at least September 1982 further 
substantiates this. Estimates of maximum longevity of worker ants 
is 1-2 yr (Rosengren 1971, Brian 1972, Nielsen 1972). Further, there 
has never been a reported case of queen adoption in any Pogono- 
myrmex species. For the host colony to have a normal foraging 
