Platythyrea Roger, 1863

Eguchi, Katsuyuki, Viet, Bui Tuan & Yamane, Seiki, 2014, Generic Synopsis of the Formicidae of Vietnam (Insecta: Hymenoptera), Part II — Cerapachyinae, Aenictinae, Dorylinae, Leptanillinae, Amblyoponinae, Ponerinae, Ectatomminae and Proceratiinae, Zootaxa 3860 (1), pp. 1-46 : 39

Platythyrea Roger, 1863

Taxonomy. The genus Platythyrea is assigned to the tribe Platythyreini ( Bolton 2003) .

Morphology. Workers of Vietnamese species have the following features (see also Brown 1975, Schmidt & Shattuck 2014):

Worker monomorphic; body densely and finely punctured, covered with fine pubescence, without standing hairs; head in full-face view elongate, subrectangular; antennal socket mostly covered by horizontal frontal lobe; antennal scrobe absent; anteromedian margin of clypeus convex; posteromedian portion of clypeus widely inserted between frontal lobes; mandible subtriangular, with an apical tooth followed by serrate masticatory margin; antenna 12-segmented, gradually incrassate from segment III to XII; eye well developed, located before midlength of side of head in lateral view; mesosoma in lateral view with almost straight dorsal outline; promesonotal suture distinct; mesopleuron separated well from both mesonotum and metapleuron by distinct sutures; metanotal groove absent dorsally; propodeum unarmed, but with corners where dorsal and posterior faces of propodeum meet with each other; orifice of propodeal spiracle round; propodeal lobe present but low; metacoxal dorsum with a triangular process; apicoventral part of foretibia usually without a small simple spur behind a large pectinate spur; apicoventral part of mid and hind tibia with a barbulate or pectinate spur in front of a large pectinate spur; inner curvature of pretarsal claws equipped with a tooth behind apical point; petiole without anterior peduncle; petiolar node longer than high; anteroventral part of petiole with subpetiolar process developed well as a lobe; girdling constriction between abdominal segments III and IV distinct; abdominal sternite III without an anteroventral Ushaped ridge or flange below/beneath helcium; sting well developed.

Differentiation. The worker of Platythyrea is easily distinguished from that of the other ponerine genera known from Vietnam by the following combination of features: median portion of clypeus broadly inserted between frontal lobes; metatibia with 2 pectinate spurs.

Vietnamese species (3 spp.).

P. clypeata Forel, 1911 . Zry (Cat Tien).

P. parallela (F. Smith, 1859) [senior synonym of P. coxalis annamita Forel ]. Type locality of “ P. coxalis annamita ”: Zentral-Cochinchina [central part of southern Vietnam]. Zry (Cat Tien). P. sp. eg-1 (Nui Chua, Ba Ria-Vung Tau).

Bionomics. A fragment of a colony of Platythyrea sp. eg-1 was collected under dead epiphytes on a living tree in a dry forest..