Tetramorium caldarium ( Roger, 1857 ), 2011

Sharaf, Mostafa R., Wetterer, James K., Mohamed, AbdulAziz M. A., Georgiadis, Christos, Nasser, Mohamed G. & Aldawood, Abdulrahman S., 2024, Filling gaps in global myrmecology: ants of the Kingdom of Bahrain (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), Journal of Natural History 58 (41 - 44), pp. 1705-1786 : 1763-1765

Tetramorium caldarium ( Roger, 1857)

( Figure 37 )

Tetrogmus caldarius Roger, 1857, p. 12 (w.q.) Poland. Palaearctic.

Diagnosis

Worker. The species most closely resembles T. simillimum but can be distinguished by the following characters: uniform yellow-brown, gaster usually darker than head, and mesosoma; frontal carinae extend posteriorly to level of midlength of eyes behind which they become feeble or broken, or gradually fade out at posterior margin of head; cephalic surface with shallow ground sculpture; head behind the eyes does not broaden.

Material examined

One site: 13.

Geographic range. Tetramorium caldarium is an Afrotropical native that has spread to all zoogeographical realms ( Bolton 1980; Wetterer and Hita Garcia 2015). On the Arabian Peninsula it has been collected from the KSA ( Collingwood 1985), Oman, Yemen ( Collingwood and Agosti 1996; Sharaf et al. 2018a) and the UAE ( Wetterer and Hita Garcia 2015).

Ecology and biology. This species is generally found in open disturbed areas ( Collingwood 1979; Bolton 1980; Wetterer 2015), usually near buildings, in or near paved areas, in hollow twigs ( Deyrup 2017) and heat houses ( Deyrup et al. 2000; Espadaler 2007), in the leaf litter of irrigated public parks ( Sharaf et al. 2018) and in regions with high anthropogenic activity ( Bharti and Kumar 2012). Nests are built directly in the earth under rocks where the soil is dry and loose and it was found in an area cultivated with rose ( Sharaf et al. 2018b) and mango ( Mangifera indica ) ( Anacardiaceae ) ( Taylor et al. 2018). Diet includes dead insects and cookie crumbs ( Deyrup 2017).

Figures

Figure 37. Tetramorium caldarium. Worker. (A) Body in profile. (B) Head in full-face view, ANTWEB1041899, AntWeb.org (Michele Esposito). (C) Distribution map.