Monomorium nitidiventre Emery

Type location Yemen (Monomorium bicolor ssp nitidventris, Emery, 1893f: 256, worker; Mayr, 1901b: 7, queen; Karavaiev, 1911: 5 , male; raised to species Collingwood, 1985: 272); type location wrongly given in Bolton (1995: 265) as Egypt; new junior synonym - judaicum (Menozzi, 1933b: 63, illustrated, worker) from Israel (transferred from subspecies of bicolor) .

Emery's (1893f) simply noted, specimens from Aden [Yemen], collected by E Simon, - "differs from type (bicolor) by its smaller size, TL 2.6-2.8 mm; by its clear colour, which is more orange where the type is red and by the shiny gaster. Received also from Cairo". Emery (1908h: 677) had an illustrated note at . Karavaiev (1911) had and . Viehmeyer (1923) had . Menozzi's (1933b) illustrated description of judaicum is at .

Collingwood (1985) noted "This small bicoloured species ... differs from M. bicolor in the shorter head and appendages, the scape does not reach the occipital border - and by the presence of more numerous long dorsal hairs all over the alitrunk" - Collingwood & Agosti (1996: 353) noted - "This species was misinterpreted and partly misidentified in Collingwood (1985)".
We (BT) find their description inconsistent with the, admittedly sketchy, original description, and the later note by Emery (1908h); assuming Emery's drawing to be accurate, the CI is ca 74 and the SI at least 100; the specimens from Iran, below, match Emery's description and note. It clearly shows the bluish sheen to the gaster and has the smaller size, etc., described for nitidiventre.
Collingwood & Agosti have CI 89 SI 90 and comment -"The Arabian examples are larger than those from Greece [giving no reference to any such collections] but the two populations cannot be distinguished on morphology or colour"; in their key (p 337 ff) nitidiventre is separated out by ...15 alitrunk without projecting hairs ... 16 head and alitrunk clear red, contrasting with dark gaster ... 17 eyes small, 0.25 times HW or less... 18 propodeal dorsum with a distinct longitudinal furrow ... 19 propodeum low with rounded posterior face; head narrow CI less than 75 - the latter conflicts with their own data!.

Egypt records - in HNS as Monomorium bicolor subsp. nitidiventris Emery; Mayr (1904b: 4) recorded it from Aswan, Cairo and Aden; from Cairo and Aswan in Karavaiev (1911:5); Wheeler & Mann (1916) from Cairo; Viehmeyer (1923) has records from Nubbaka - Sungikai, Keiga Tummero - Kadugli, El Egheibish; Alfieri (1931) gave numerous findings from all over the country. Mohamad (1979) records include - Gezira, 23.viii.1923 (Det. Santschi, 1937); Egypt, (Det. Crawley, 1927); Giza, 9.x.1928; Cairo, 5.ix.1936 (Coll.Alf.) Luxor, 3.viii.1945, Aswan, 7.viii.1945, Asiut, 4.ii.1975; Burg El-Arab (Alexandria), 26.iii.1975; Benisuef, 1.v.1975; Ghardaqa (Red Sea), 23.i.1978; Safaga (Red Sea), 24.i.1978; Quseir (Red Sea), 25.i.1978; Kharga oasis (Western desert), 28.i.1978 (Coll.Ain.) Sakkara road (Giza), 15.x.1933 (Coll.Min.) Egypt, (Det. Crawley, 1927) (Coll.Soc.)

The photomontage is of a specimen (which I originally thought was "bicolor judaicum") from Iran, Fars Province, collected by Omid Paknia. Other images can be seen in the folder at -