Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-dk4vv Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-27T08:43:22.012Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The earliest known ants: an analysis of the Cretaceous species and an inference concerning their social organization

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 April 2016

E. O. Wilson
E. O. Wilson*
Affiliation:
Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02138
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The known Cretaceous formicoids are better interpreted from morphological evidence as forming a single subfamily, the Sphecomyrminae, and even a single genus, Sphecomyrma, rather than multiple families and genera. The females appear to have been differentiated as queen and worker castes belonging to the same colonial species instead of winged and wingless solitary females belonging to different species. The former conclusion is supported by the fact that the abdomens of workers of modern ant species and extinct Miocene ant species are smaller relative to the rest of the body than is the case for modern wingless solitary wasps. The wingless Cretaceous formicoids conform to the proportions of ant workers rather than to those of wasps (Figs. 1–2) and hence are reasonably interpreted to have lived in colonies.

The Cretaceous formicoids are nevertheless anatomically primitive with reference to modern ants and share some key traits with nonsocial aculeate wasps. They were distributed widely over Laurasia and appear to have been much less abundant than modern ants.

Type
Articles
Information
Paleobiology , Volume 13 , Issue 1 , Winter 1987 , pp. 44 - 53
Copyright
Copyright © The Paleontological Society 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Literature Cited

Carpenter, F. M. 1930. The fossil ants of North America. Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool. Harvard. 70:1–67.Google Scholar
Carpenter, F. M., Folsom, J. W., Essig, E. O., Kinsey, A. C., Brues, C. T., Boesel, M. W., and Ewing, H. E. 1939. Insects and arachnids from Canadian amber. Univ. Toronto Stud., Geol. Ser. 40:7–62.Google Scholar
Dlussky, G. M. 1975. Formicoidea, Formicidae, Sphecomyrminae. Pp. 114–122. In: Rasnitsyn, A. P., ed., The Higher Hymenoptera of the Mesozoic. Trans. Paleontol. Inst. AN SSR 147 [in Russian].Google Scholar
Dlussky, G. M. 1983. A new family of Upper Cretaceous Hymenoptera: an “intermediate link” between the ants and the scolioids. Paleontol. Zhurn. no. 3:65–78[in Russian].Google Scholar
Eysinga, F. W. B. van. 1978. Geological time table (published chart). Elsevier; Amsterdam.Google Scholar
Traniello, J. F. A. 1982. Population structure and social organization in the primitive ant Amblyopone pallipes (Hymenoptera: Formicidae). Psyche. 89:65–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wheeler, W. M. 1914. The ants of the Baltic amber. Schrift. Phys.-ökon. Ges. Königsberg. 55:1–142.Google Scholar
Wilson, E. O. 1971. The Insect Societies. Belknap, Harvard Univ. Press; Cambridge.Google Scholar
Wilson, E. O. 1985a. Ants from the Cretaceous and Eocene amber of North America. Psyche. 92:205–216.Google Scholar
Wilson, E. O. 1985b. Invasion and extinction in the West Indian ant fauna: evidence from the Dominican amber. Science. 229:265–267.Google Scholar
Wilson, E. O., Carpenter, F. M., and Brown, W. L. 1967a. The first Mesozoic ants. Science. 157:1038–1040.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wilson, E. O., Carpenter, F. M., and Brown, W. L. 1967b. The first Mesozoic ants, with the description of a new subfamily. Psyche. 74:1–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar