Species: Camponotus ager

Taxonomic History (provided by Barry Bolton, 2013)

Distribution:

Costa Rica to Brazil. Costa Rica: moist and wet forested habitats throughout the country, sea level to 500m elevation (Braulio Carrillo National Park, La Selva, Est. Maritza in Guanacaste Conservation Area, Hitoy Cerere, Osa Peninsula, Carara).

Biology:

Natural History:

This species inhabits mature wet to moist forest habitats. It is usually encountered as individual foragers on vegetation in the forest understory. Foragers appear to be strictly nocturnal; I have only seen foragers at night. I have twice collected major workers, also as isolated workers collected at night. On one of the occasions there were raiding army ants in the vicinity, so it could be that major workers are only encountered when they are flushed by army ants. I have never found a nest.

At La Selva this species has been collected mainly by manual search at night, although a few workers and an alate queen were collected in a Malaise trap. The species has not occurred in canopy fogging samples. Thus C. ager appears to be a relatively low density species, and the nesting habits are completely unknown. In spite of its apparent low density, workers are relatively easy to find because they are dramatically large ants, easily seen at night by searching with a flashlight.

References:

Smith, F. 1858. Catalogue of hymenopterous insects in the collection of the British Museum. Part VI. Formicidae. London: British Museum, 216 pp.

Taxon Page Author History

Specimen Data Summary

Found most commonly in these habitats: 17 times found in montane wet forest, 2 times found in wet forest, 2 times found in ridgetop cloud forest, 2 times found in Trampa #5, 1 times found in 2nd growth veg., 1 times found in lowland rainforest, 1 times found in mature and second growth wet forest, 1 times found in pasture near edge of tropical wet forest, 1 times found in Primary wet forest, 1 times found in Sura, ...

Collected most commonly using these methods or in the following microhabitats: 16 times Malaise, 11 times Search, 6 times flight intercept trap, 1 times beating, 1 times blacklight, 1 times FIT, 1 times Sweeping

Elevations: collected from 30 - 1110 meters, 397 meters average

3 Specimens Imaged | View All 48 Specimens for this species

CASENT0903648

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INBIOCRI001218763

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INBIOCRI001282861

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