1965] 
Brown — Typhlomyrmecini 
71 
50: 248, female, male (in cop.). Type locality: San Bernardino, Para- 
guay. Type examined in Coll. Forel, Museum d'Histoire Naturelle, 
Geneva. New synonymy. 
Typhlomyrmex richardsi Donisthorpe, 1939, Ent. mon. Mag., 75: 161, male. 
TL: Mazaruni Clearing, British Guiana. Type series examined in 
British Museum (Natural History). New synonymy. 
This species is distinguished in all castes by means of the wide 
head; long, falcate apical mandibular tooth (Figs. 4, 5) ; and oblique 
basal borders of the mandibles, which fail to meet the clypeus when 
closed. The worker-female antennal club is prominent, as the name 
suggests, and the petiolar node is short. A single worker (taken at 
Bartica, British Guiana by H. O. Lang, together with winged 
females) has a head length, without mandibles, of 0.67 and a head 
width of 0.65 mm., which is within the size range of the smaller T. 
rogenhoferi workers. 
The type series of T. richardsi consists of numerous males, ac- 
companied on one card by a female specimen ( the latter not mentioned 
by Donisthorpe). The differences cited among the synonymous 
species by Forel and Donisthorpe mainly concern mandibular form 
and the proportions of the antennal segments. On examining all the 
types and comparing them with digms from British Guiana, I was 
impressed by the similarity of the mandibles between members of the 
same caste from different series. The basal segments of the funiculus 
show noticeable variation in length among males, even in those on 
one card, and I do not think they make a good diagnostic character. 
T. clavicornis is known from the above-mentioned widely separated 
localities in South America, ranging from Bolivia and Paraguay north 
to British Guiana. A female with forewings missing, probably fully 
alate when captured, comes from the Floresta di Tijuca, near Rio de 
Janeiro, February i960, C. A. Campos Seabra leg. The T. richardsi 
types were a part of a large series (apparently nearly all males) taken 
from a nest of the social vespid Polybia bistriata. 
Typhlomyrmex major , new status 
Typhlomyrmex pusillus st. major Santschi, 1923, Rev. Suisse Zool., 30: 246, 
worker. Type locality: Blumenau, Santa Catarina, Brazil. Location of 
type unknown (not in Santschi Collection). 
Explanation of Plate 5 
Figures 1-6, Typhlomyrmex spp. Fig. 1 , T. pusillus worker from El Rey, 
Salta, Argentina, lateral view of body. Fig. 2, Same, head in full-face view. 
Fig. 3, T. rogenhoferi, large worker, lateral view of petiole. Fig. 4, T. 
clavicornis, mandible of gyne from British Guiana, hairs omitted. Fig. 5, 
T. clavicornis from British Guiana, full-face view of male head. Fig. 6, 
T. prolatus sp. nov., fertiale holotype, anterodorsal view of right mandible. 
Drawings by Nancy Buffler, D. Alsop and the author. 
