Open access journal: http://periodicos.uefs.br/ojs/index.php/sociobiology
ISSN: 0361-6525

DOI: 10.13102/sociobiology.v62i2.331-333Sociobiology 62(2): 331-333 (June, 2015)

First Record of the Genus Mycetarotes (Emery, 1913) (Formicidae: Myrmicinae) from Colombia

Abstract 
We report the first record of fungus-growing ant genus 
Mycetarotes (Formicidae: Myrmicinae) in Colombia, with the 
species M. parallelus (Emery, 1906).

Keywords 
Fungus growing ant, biodiversity, ants, oil palm, Colombia Llanos. 

Sociobiology
An international journal on social insects

AF Sánchez1,2, CA Medina3, GW Prescott4

Article History

Edited by
John Lattke, Universidad Nacional de Loja, Ecuador
Received                                         01 December 2014
Initial acceptance                         20 February 2015
Final acceptance                           21 February 2015

Corresponding author
Andrés Fernando Sánchez Restrepo
Fundación para el Estudio de Especies Invasivas  
Bolivar 1559 (B1686EFA), Hurlingham, Buenos 
Aires, Argentina
E-Mail: andrescp@gmail.com

of fungus-growing ants by the presence of tridentate 
occipital corners (in frontal view the occipital spines 
project between the outer spines of the occipital margin and 
supraocular spines), subparallel frontal carinae that terminate 
near the occipital margin, lateral margins of frontal lobes 
little expanded laterally and bluntly angular or rounded, and 
the absences of clearly delimited antennal scrobes. Their 
mandibles are finely and longitudinally striolate, with 5-6 
teeth on the masticatory margin (Kempf, 1960; Mayhé-
Nunes & Brandão, 2006).

Kempf (1960) carried out the first revision of the 
genus and recognized two species M. senticosus and M. 
parallelus. Before this, it was initially described as a 
subgenus of Cyphomyrmex by Emery (1913). Forel (1913) 
questioned the validity of this taxonomic rank, and Borgmeier 
(1950) elevated it to genus. Mayhé-Nunes & Brandão (2006) 
reviewed the genus, with synoptic descriptions of workers and 
known reproductives of the four known species and updated 
information about the distribution records, nest architecture, 
and biology. Here we observe for the first time the presence of 
the myrmicine ant genus Mycetarotes in Colombia.

SHORT  NOTE

1 - Fundación para el Estudio de Especies Invasivas (FuEDEI), Buenos Aires, Argentina
2 - Universidad de Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires, Argentina
3 - Instituto de Investigación de Recursos Biológicos Alexander von Humboldt, Villa de Leyva, Colombia
4 - University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

Introduction

To date in Colombia there are about 330 species of 
myrmicine ants, and of these 40 are fungus-growing ants 
(Fernández & Sendoya, 2004). Members of the fungus-
growing ants belong to the Atta-genus group or “Attine ants” 
in old sense (after Ward et al., 2014) and its geographical 
distribution range covers Central and South America and 
southern North America (Mayhé-Nunes & Jaffé, 1998). They 
characterized by having a mutualistic relationship with a 
fungus (in most cases a Leucoprineaceae), where obligately 
depend on the cultivation of the fungus for food and the 
fungus, in return, gain protection (Mehdiabadi & Schultz, 
2009). These are some of the most ecologically important 
ants, and include among their number some of the dominant 
herbivores inthe Neotropics (Wilson & Hölldobler, 1990).

The ant genus Mycetarotes is represented by four 
species, all neotropical: M. acutus Mayhé-Nunes 1995; 
M. carinatus Mayhé-Nunes, 1995; M. paralellus (Emery, 
1906), and M. senticosus Kempf, 1960. The workers are 
monomorphic and can be distinguished from other members 



AF Sánchez, CA Medina, GW Prescott – First Record of the Genus Mycetarotes from Colombia332

Material and methods

The material examined comes from a study comparing 
the biodiversity of several taxa in forest, oil palm plantations, 
and cattle pastures in the Colombian llanos (Giloryet al., 
2014). We sampled ants using pitfalls traps, following Agosti 
et al. (2000). We based our measures on those used by Mayhé-
Nunes and Brandão (2006), and carried them out using a Leica 
(80x) stereomicroscope at 60x magnification with an ocular 
micrometer. We measured: TL, total length; HL, head length 
(except mandibles); HW, head width (including eyes); IFW, inter 
frontal width (distance between the lateral margins of frontal 
lobes); ScL, scape length; WL, Weber’s length (alitrunk length); 
CI, cephalic index (HW/HL x 100); and FLI, frontal lobes index 
(IFW/HW x 100).

Results and Discussion

Subfamily Myrmicinae
Mycetarotes parallelus (Emery, 1906)

Material examined: 2 workers, COLOMBIA, Meta, 
Cabuyaro, 4°17’36.3”N 72°57’38.1”W, 189m, 12-feb-
2013, Pitfall trap in oil palm plantation, G.W. Prescott leg.
[IAvH-E-143891]. Deposited and preserved point mounted, in 
the entomology collection of the “Instituto de Investigación de 
Recursos Biológicos Alexander von Humboldt (IAvH)” Villa 
de Leyva, Colombia.

The workers analyzed share all the diagnostic 
characters listed by Kempf (1960) and Mayhé-Nunes and 
Brandão (2006) for the genus Mycetarotes. We identified it 
as M. parallelus, which can be clearly distinguished by the 
following characters: two pairs of spines on the mesonotum 
(where other members of the genus have three pairs), well 
developed petiolar spines, postpetiole without a tooth near 
each side of the lateral anterior margin, weakly marked outer 
frontal carinae branches, and a deep circular impression 
on the dorsal surface of the postpetiole (Mayhé-Nunes & 
Brandão 2006). Additionally the specimen has an opaque 
integument, reddish-brown head color, yellowish legs and 
mesosoma, dark gaster with erect hairs absent and sparse 
appressed hairs. We futher corroborated the identification with 
photographs of the type species provided by the online database 
AntWeb v5.9 (AntWeb, 2014). The measurements taken from 
one of the workers (in mm) are: TL= 3.4; HL= 0.80; HW= 0.91; 
IFW=0.26; ScL= 0.85; WL= 1.02; CI= 113.75; FLI= 28.58. In 
general these measures are within the expected range or very 
close, except for the CI index which is a bit higher and FLI index 
is more lower than that reported by Mayhé-Nunes & Brandão 
(2006).

All published records of Mycetarotes to date have 
been from South America, with most records from Brazilian 
Amazon to southeastern Brazil and northern Argentina (Solomon 
et al., 2004; Mayhé-Nunes & Brandão, 2006). In additional 

to their distribution in Brazil (described by Mayhé-Nunes 
& Brandão, 2006), the genus has recently been recorded in 
Venezuela (Goitía & Jaffé, 2009), French Guyana (Dias-
Ferreira et al., 2012), Ecuador (Salazar & Donoso, 2013) and 
Guyana (Schultz & Sosa-Calvo, 2006). Our record of Mycetarotes 
is the first report from Colombia and matches an expected pattern 
of distribution, where the records in Venezuela and Colombia 
possibly correspond to the northern boundary of genus.

The M. parallelus is the most widespread and common 
of all species of the genus (Mayhé-Nunes & Jaffé, 1998), in 
contrast to the other species of the genus which are uncommon 
and whose distributions are restricted to specific conditions 
(Mayhé-Nunes, 1995; Mayhé-Nunes & Lanziotti, 2004). 
Unlike other Mycetarotes species M. parallelus commonly 
lives in open habitats, gallery forest, secondary forest, and 
disturbed habitats (Solomon et al., 2004). This trend is 
corroborated by our discovery of Mycetarotes workers in a 
mature oil palm plantation, located in the Colombian Llanos 
(a seminatural system dominated by grasslands interspersed 
with wet and dry forests) (Gilory et al., 2014).

The ant fauna of Colombia is very rich (see Fernández 
& Sendoya 2004; Pérez et al., 2009; Vergara-Navarro & 
Serna, 2013), but more comprehensive sampling will be 
needed to fully understand its richness and distribution across 
Colombia. The presence of Mycetarotes is a clear example of 
what remains to be known.

Acknowledgments

We thank the staff of the Instituto de Investigación 
de Recursos Biológicos Alexander von Humboldt for 
their logistical support. Fernando Fernández for help with 
identification of the ants. Plantation managers at Palumea Ltda, 
Copalma Ltda, and Guajcaramo S.A. for allowing access to 
their land, and to Apolinar Rojas of Asohumea for helping us 
to coordinate our research. Finally, we thank two anonymous 
reviewers who made valuable comments and useful suggestions 
that improved the quality of the manuscript.

References

Agosti, D., Majer, J., Alonso, E. & Schultz, T.R. (Eds.) 
(2000). Ants: Standard Methods for Measuring and Monitoring 
Biodiversity. Biological Diversity Handbook Series.
Smithsonian Institution Press. Washington D.C., USA.

AntWeb. http://www.antweb.org/. (accessed date: 21 April 
2014).

Borgmeier, T. (1950). Bemerkungenzu Dr. Creighton’s Werk 
“The Ants of North America”. Revista de Entomologia, 21: 
381-386.

Dias-Ferreira, F., Maurice Madkaud, J., Freyre, P. (2012).
Description of ant communities in dead wood ofthe French 
Guiana rainforest and impact of disturbances on diversity.



Sociobiology 62(2): 331-333 (June, 2015) 333

Université des Antilles et de la Guyane. http://www.ecofog.
gf/IMG/pdf/ants.pdf (accessed date: 2 Feb 2015).

Emery, C. (1906). Studi sulle formiche della fauna neotropica. 
XXVI. Bullettino della Società Entomologica Italiana, 37: 
107-194.

Emery, C. (1913). Études sur les Myrmicinae.V-VII. Annales 
de la Société Entomologique de Belgique, 57: 250–262.

Fernández, F. & Sendoya, S. (2004). List of neotropical ants 
(Hymenoptera: Formicidae). Biota Colombiana, 5(1): 3-109.

Forel, A. (1913). Fourmis d’Argentine, du Brésil, du 
Guatémala & de Cuba. Bulletin de la Société Vaudoise des 
Sciences Naturelles, 49: 203-250.

Gilroy, J.J., Prescott, G.W., Cardenas, J.S., Castañeda, 
P.G.d.P., Sánchez, A.F., Rojas-Murcia, L. E., Medina Uribe, 
C.A., Haugaasen, T. & Edwards, D.P. (2014). Minimizing 
the biodiversity impact of Neotropical oil palm development.
Global Change Biology, doi: 10.1111/gcb.12696

Goitía, W. & Jaffé, K. (2009).Ant-Plant Associations in 
Different Forests in Venezuela. Neotropical Entomology, 
38:7-31. doi: 10.1590/S1519-566X2009000100002

Hölldobler, B.; Wilson, O.E. (1990). The Ants. Harvard 
University Press. USA. 732 p.

Kempf, W. (1960). A review of the ant genus “Mycetatores” 
Emery (Hymenoptera, Formicidae). Revista Brasileira de 
Biologia, 20: 277-283.

Mayhé-Nunes, A. J. & Jaffé, K. (1998). On the biogeography 
of Attini (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). Ecotropicos, 11: 45-54.

Mayhé-Nunes, A.J. (1995). Sinopse do gênero Mycetarotes 
(Hym.,Formicidae), com a descrição de duas especies novas. 
Boletín de Entomologia Venezolana, 10: 197-205.

Mayhé-Nunes, A.J. & Brandão, C.R. (2006). Revisionary 
notes on the fungus-growing ant genus Mycetarotes Emery 
(Hymenoptera, Formicidae). Revista Brasileira de Entomologia, 
50: 463-472. doi: 10.1590/S0085-56262006000400005.

Mayhé-Nunes, A.J. & Lanziotti, A.M. (2004). Description of 
the female and male of Mycetarotes carinatus (Hymenoptera: 
Formicidae). Revista de Biologia Tropical, 52: 109-114. doi: 
10.15517/rbt.v52i1.14758.

Mehdiabadi, N.E., & Schultz, T. (2009). Natural history and 
phylogeny of the fungus-farming ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae: 
Myrmicinae: Attini). Myrmecological News, 13: 37-55.

Pérez, L.G., Pérez, G.A., Echeverri-Rubiano, C., Sánchez, 
A.F., Durán, J. & Pedraza, L.M. (2009). Riqueza de hormigas 
(Hymenoptera: Formicidae) en Várzea y Bosque de Tierra 
Firme de la region amazónica colombiana. Boletín de la 
Sociedad Entomológica Aragonesa, 45: 477-483.

Salazar, F., & Donoso, D.A. (2013). New ant (Hymenoptera: 
Formicidae) records for Ecuador deposited at the Carl 
Rettenmeyer ant collection in the QCAZ Museum. Boletín 
Técnico 11, Serie Zoológica, 8: 150-175.

Schultz, T. R., & Sosa-Calvo, J. (2008). Chapter 2 – Ants 
of Southern Guyana - a preliminary report (pp. 31-32). In: 
Alonso, L.E., McCullough, J., Naskrecki, P., Alexander, E. 
& Wright, H.E. (eds.). A rapid biological assessment of the 
Konashen Community Owned Conservation Area, Southern 
Guyana. RAP Bulletin of Biological Assessment 51. 
Conservation International, Arlington, VA, USA.

Solomon, S.E., Mueller, U.G., Schultz, T.R., Currie, C.R., 
Price, S.L.; Oliveira da Silva-Pinhati, A.C.; Bacci Jr., M. 
&Vasconcelos, H.L. (2004). Nesting biology of the fungus 
growing ants Mycetarotes Emery (Attini, Formicidae). Insectes 
Sociaux, 51: 333-338. doi: 10.1007/s00040-004-0742-4.

Vergara-Navarro, E.V., & Serna, F. (2013). A checklist 
of the ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) of the department 
of Antioquia, Colombia and new records for the country. 
Agronomía Colombiana, 31: 324-342.

Ward, P.S., Brady, S.G., Fisher, B.L., & Schultz, T.R. (2014). 
The evolution of myrmicine ants: phylogeny and biogeography 
of a hyperdiverse ant clade (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). 
Systematic Entomology, 40, 61-81. doi: 10.1111/syen.12090.