Proceratium numidicum

Brown, W. L., 1980, A remarkable new species of Proceratium, with dietary and other notes on the genus (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)., Psyche 86, pp. 337-346 : 343

Proceratium numidicum in Europe

Baroni Urbani (1977) calls into question my 1958 identification of Proceratium numidicum from Tirana, Albania, saying that "appar- ently this specimen has not been studied by Brown himself, but by Wilson..." He adduces other circumstantial evidence to conclude that the Albanian specimen is really P. melinum . But Baroni Urbani never called for a loan of the specimen in question, which resides in the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard University, and if he had done so, he would have been forced to conclude, as I was originally (Brown, 1958:334) after my own personal study of the same example, that the Tirana specimen is morphologically P. numidicum , and not P. melinum . The two species are in fact members of different species-groups. At my request, in 1955 or 1956, E. O. Wilson did compare the Albanian specimen with a type of P. numidicum (Brown, 1974: 82) in the Emery Collection. This comparison was based on my previous suspicion that the Albanian specimen (then under my care in MCZ) belonged to numidicum . Since that time, I have had ample opportunity to compare the relevant types directly with the Albanian specimen and to confirm once more my own opinion of its identity. Finzi's old determination as "europaea," as well as Baroni Urbani's conjecture, are both wrong. Unless the label data are in error, P. numidicum must be considered to occur in Balkan Europe.