Wm. S. Creighton.
A New Subspecies of Crematogaster minutissima with Revisionary Notes Concerning that Species. (Hymenoptera: Formicidæ).
Psyche 47:137-140, 1940.

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19391 A New Subspecies of Crematogaster 137 A NEW SUBSPECIES OF CREMATOGASTER
MZNUTZSSZMA WITH REVISIONARY NOTES
CONCERNING THAT SPECIES.
(HYMENOPTERA :FORMICIDB)
College of the City of New York.
In 1895 Car10 Emery published the second half of his mon- ograph dealing with North American ants. A considerable proportion of the material on which this work was based had come to Emery from Pergande who was7 at that time' con- nected with the National Museum. As a general rule Per- gande gave no names to the ants which he sent to his col- league probably because, in most cases, he was not sure as to what was new. In the instance which I wish to discuss here, however, Pergande had not only recognized the form as new but had selected the name which it now bears. There seems to be no other interpretation which can be placed upon Emery's treatment of Crematogaster victima subsp. missouriemis. Emery attributed this form to Pergande, stating that the latter had used the name in litteris. There is no method whe,reby one can determine whether Pergande was actually preparing to publish a description of missouriensis and it makes very little difference if he was. Emery accompanied his citation of the form with a brief characterization per- mitting its recognition. This, of course, is the original de- scription of missouriensis, which is to be attributed to Emery and not Pergande. I do not doubt that many would regard this as a flagrant case of name-grabbing but it is by no means certain that such was the case. It is difficult to believe that Emery supposed that he could give missouriensis to Per- gande by merely citing him as author. It seems more prob- able that Emery was under the impression that Pergande would publish the description of the new form before the appearance of his (Emery's) monograph and that he inad-



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138 Psyche [~eeetnhr
vertently let slip into print a manuscript notation which was to have been subsequently altered. It is easier to be tolerant of this mistake than it is to agree with Emery's treatment of the taxonomic status of rn~sowiemis, I can see no reason why he sh~uld have assigned it to victim instead of to Mayr's minuti~sim. In 1870 Mayr had published a key to the New World ~pecies of G~emtogustw in wkh he clearly distinguished between the characteristics of Smith's victim and his own mi~utissim. Emery must surely have employed Mayr's key and just as surdy he should have been aware . that missmriemia is more closely related to minutkim than to vktima. The distinct areas of cephalic punctures which are present in vktim are absent in the other two forms. In recent yeam the recognition of a number of addi- tional subspecies has comiderab~y expanded the specific limits of victim. Even so the above contention can be de- fended. Still more peculiar is Emery's disregard for m6geo- graphical considerations.
When he assigned m~~ou~e~is
to vietima the Iattex species was known only from Brad. It would certainly have ~eemed more logical to consider the possibility of relationship with a species which had been found in the Gulf Coast region. As far as 1 can determine no one has ever questhed Emery's judgment in the matter- Dmpite this 1 believe that m&sou~&~& should be regarded as a northern race of minuhksima.
In addition there is a
western race which is described below.
The subspecies thorucica differs from the typical form and the subspecies missourhm& in its disfhctly more shining thoracic dorsum. In both the other two form the domum of the pxomesonotum bears, in addition to longitudinal mg~, a number of fine and fairly close-set punctures. The~e punctures, while not dense enough to produce an opaque appearance, dull the surface to a considerable extent. They are not present in the ~ubspecies thrach, In addition tho~ucfm usudly lacka longitudinal .mw on the pronoturn and, when they are presentB they appear to form a wavy border at the extreme edge of the pronoturn. The longi-



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19391 A New Subspecies of Crematogaster 139 tudinal rug= in the typical minutissima are well developed and at least two of them lie well in towards the center of the pronotum. In missouriensis the rug= are variable in posi- tion but when they occur at the edge of the thorax, as fre- quently happens, they are more prominent than in thoracica. The shape of the petiole seen from above is usually quite characteristic in thoracica. The sides gently diverge behind so that the petiole is widest at the rear. The difference is not great but the wedge-like appearance is rather different flrom that of the other two subspecies, where the petiole is more quadrate with the sides subparallel and widest7 if there is much difference in width, at the middle. The epinotal spines of thoracica are short like those of the typical form. In other respects thoracica is very similar to the typical minutissima. Described from a series of workers taken by W. M. Mann in Miller Canyon, Huachuca Mountains, Arizona (elevation 6000 ft.). In addition to this type series I have seen other specimens also secured by Dr. Mann, in Ramsey Canyon (elevation 5800 ft.) in the Huachucas.
Holotype (worker) and a series of paratypes in the col- lection of the Museum of Comparative Zoology. Additional paratypes in the collection of the American Museum of Natural History and the collection of the writer. The three subspecies of minutissima and our single re- maining species in the subgenus Orthocrema, Cr. (0.) ari- zonensis7 may be separated as follows :
1. Tip of the antennal scape in repose notably su,rpassing the occipital border; color yellow ; the gaster clothed with abundant long hairs ---------------------------------------------- 2 T,ip of the antennal scape in repose failing to reach the occipital border ; color piceous brown ; the erect hairs of the gaster short and sparse : -------------------- arizon,emis 2. Dorsum of the p~romesonotum very smooth and shin- ing; rug=, if present, feeble and confined to the edge of the pronotum : ------------------------ minutissima thoracica Dorsum of the promesonotum finely punctate in addi- tion to the longitudinal rugq the surface feebly shin- ing; rug= well-developed and often placed towards the center of the thorax ------------------------------------------------ 3



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140 Psyche [December
3. Epinotal spines about one-half as long as the distance which separates their bases and rathe,r strongly di- rected upward ; pronotum with the rug= usually lat- eral in position : minutissima missouriensis Epinotal spines less than half as long as the distance which separafes their bases and directed more back- ward than upward; pronotum with two prominent rug= near the middle :----------minxbtissima minutissima



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