Dorylus (Typhlopone) fulvus (Westwood) subspecies badius (Gerstaecker) variety obscurior Santschi

Wheeler, W. M., 1922, The ants collected by the American Museum Congo Expedition., Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History 45, pp. 39-269 : 49-50

Dorylus (Typhlopone) fulvus (Westwood) subspecies badius (Gerstaecker) variety obscurior Santschi

Vankerckhovenville, [[soldier]], [[worker]], [[male]]; Faradje, [[soldier]], [[worker]]; Garamba, [[worker]]; Batama, [[male]]; Stanleyville, [[male]] (Lang and Chapin); Avakubi, [[male]] (Lieut. Boyton). Both the worker and male of this form have a characteristic color. Santschi described only the worker from Konakry, French Guinea. The Congo specimens measure 5 to 13 mm. and have the head, thorax, petiole, and legs rich chestnut brown, the gaster brownish yellow, the mandibles and antennae nearly black. The smallest workers are more uniformly brownish yellow. The differences in form between this and the typical badius of South Africa are slight. Santschi describes the head, the base of the epinotum, and the petiole as broader in obscurior . In my specimens the head of the soldier (Fig. 2a) closely resembles that of the variety eurous from East Africa as figured by Emery.

The males (Fig. 2b-f) taken from the same colony as the workers are also much darker than those of the subspecies badius and variety eurous or the typical fulvus from North Africa. They measure 33 to 36 mm., with the thorax somewhat less than 6 mm. broad, and are chocolate brown, with the head blackish and the gaster a shade paler than the thorax and petiole. The wing membranes are also of a little duller and deeper tint. The hairs and pubescence are less golden and less shining, more grayish. The male genitaha are intermediate in the structure of the stipes between those of the typical fulvus and the subspecies badius , as will be seen by comparing my figures with Emery's.1 The specimens from Batama and Avakubi are distinctly paler than the others in the series but can hardly be regarded as belonging to a different variety.

Concerning the Vankerckhovenville colony from which both workers and males were taken, Mr. Lang writes: "These ants were collected on the floor of an Azande hut. The workers and big males were swarming out of a hole in the ground during the night. These driver ants are not annoying to human beings, but have subterranean habits. They never walk in columns on the surface like the others, but whenever a piece of meat or even a jar of oil is deposited on the ground they immediately appear from below, without a tunnel or a gallery being visible from the outside."