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Avitomyrmex
| †Avitomyrmex Temporal range: Ypresian, Early Eocene McAbee, British Columbia, Canada | |
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| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Arthropoda |
| Class: | Insecta |
| Order: | Hymenoptera |
| Family: | Formicidae |
| Subfamily: | Myrmeciinae (incertae sedis) |
| Genus: | †Avitomyrmex Archibald, Cover & Moreau, 2006 |
| Type species | |
| Avitomyrmex mastax | |
| Diversity | |
| 3 fossil species (Species Checklist) | |
Almost all known specimens of this fossil genus are queens, with an exception of a single fossilised worker.
Baroni Urbani (2008) found that currently available specimens of this genus did not provide characters sufficient for placement to subfamily or even family and treated it as incertae sedis in Hymenoptera, while noting that overall morphological characters and wings show the specimens are undoubtedly a hymenopteran insect. However, Dlussky (2012) accepted the classification of Archibald and colleagues without mentioning the comments of Baroni Urbani (2008).
Identification
Distribution
This taxon is known from McAbee, British Columbia, Canada (Ypresian, Early Eocene).
Castes
Phylogeny
| Myrmeciinae |
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See Phylogeny of Myrmeciinae for details.
Nomenclature
The following information is derived from Barry Bolton's Online Catalogue of the Ants of the World.
- †AVITOMYRMEX [incertae sedis in Myrmeciinae]
- †Avitomyrmex Archibald, Cover & Moreau, 2006: 495. Type-species: †Avitomyrmex mastax, by original designation.
References
- Archibald, S.B., Cover, S.P. & Moreau, C.S. 2006. Bulldog ants of the Eocene Okanagan Highlands and history of the subfamily. Annals of the Entomological Society of America 99: 486-523.
- Barden, P. 2017. Fossil ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae): ancient diversity and the rise of modern lineages. Myrmecological News 24: 1-30.
- Baroni Urbani, C. 2008. Orthotaxonomy and parataxonomy of true and presumed bulldog ants (Hymenoptera, Formicidae)" Doriana (Suppl. To Annali del Museo Civico di Storia Naturale Giacomo Doria) 8(358): 1–10.
- Dlussky, G.M. 2012. New fossil ants of the subfamily Myrmeciinae (Hymenoptera, Formicidae) from Germany. Paleontological Journal 46(3): 288–292 (doi:10.1134/S0031030111050054).