Monomorium sahlbergi Emery, 1898

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 : 1749-1752

Monomorium sahlbergi Emery, 1898

( Figure 29 )

Monomorium sahlbergi Emery, 1898 , (w.q.) Israel. Palaearctic.

Diagnosis

Worker. This species most closely resembles M. pharaonis from which it can be readily distinguished by the following combination of characters: pronotum and metanotum equally high in profile; metanotal groove shallowly impressed; promesonotum without setae; 1/4 of the first gastral tergite paler than rest of gaster. For detailed differential diagnosis see Boer et al. (2020).

Material examined

One site: 4.

Geographic range. Monomorium sahlbergi was originally described from Israel and has been reported from most zoogrographic regions including the Palaearctic, Australian, Nearctic, Neotropical, Afrotropical, Malagasy, and Oceanian regions ( Boer et al. 2020). On the Arabian Peninsula, it was recorded from the Dhofar Governorate ( Oman) ( Sharaf et al. 2022), the KSA ( Sharaf et al. 2023), Yemen, and the UAE ( Boer et al. 2020). Monomorium sahlbergi likely represents an invasive species since several cases of successful invasions have been detected in numerous disturbed habitats on the islands of the Galapagos and urban areas in Texas, USA, Panama City, Hawaii, Madagascar, and Reunion ( Boer et al. 2020).

Ecology and biology. In the Socotra Archipelago, this species nests directly in organic-rich humid soil beneath a banana tree ( Sharaf et al. 2017) where numerous pselaphine beetles exist in the same habitat.

Figures

Figure 29. Monomorium sahlbergi. Worker. (A) Body in profile. (B) Head in full-face view, ANTWEB1041895, AntWeb.org (Michele Esposito). (C) Distribution map.