The Neotropical Species of the Ant Genus Strumigenys Fr. Smith: Miscellaneous Concluding Studies

very close, and seem, from the limited material available, to replace one another in a chain extending from Mexico to Panama, and perhaps beyond. So far as I can see now, the differences, are complex enough and strong enough to indicate that each form is a distinct species; perhaps together [they constitute] one superspecies. However, it is not beyond possibility that one or more o these forms intergrades with a neighbor. More material is needed." Since that writing, material has turned up which, though small in amount, tends to bridge the gap between S. micretes Brown and S. ,.acacoca Brown, indicating perhaps that they belong to. a single variable species. Nevertheless, the new material poses certain problems itself, and the discussion next offered is intended to give details that should help in eventually straightening this complex out. A sample consisting of parts of four nest series from Boquete, Chiriqui Province, Panama (F. Y[. Gaige leg., see below) contains 25 workers with highly variable preapical mandibular dentition, the denticles varying in number from to 4 in the two mandibles taken together, and also varying markedly in size, acuteness and position, so as to bridge virtually completely the chief diagnostic character-gap between micretes (each mandible with a small but acute preapical tooth, and a little arther up a minute denticle) and lacacoca (man-