Amblyopone ants

The photos at the top are of male Stigmatomma (aka Amblyopone) ants were collected by Ozell Gilmore in Columbia California, 4 August 2016. The second set is from the Tuolumne City area.

Philip Ward‘s A synoptic review of the ants of California” says there are two species within California. To quote from that source: “Ants in the genus Amblyopone (=Stigmatomma) have cryptic foraging habits and are specialist predators on geophilomorph centipedes and other arthropods living in soil or rotten wood. Two species are known from California: A. oregonensis (Wheeler) is found in shaded, medium-elevation coniferous forests in northern California, while A. pallipes (Haldeman) is widespread in chaparral and low elevation woodland.”

Click to enlarge.