Oecophylla longinoda sensu strictu (Latreille)

Type location Senegal (Formica longinoda, Latreille, 1802c, worker; minor described as Oecophylla brevinodis nov sp, André, 1890: 313) .

The original description by Latreille (1802c) is at .
My translation) is -

"The long-node ant (la Fourmi long-noeud). Formica longinoda
Rust-coloured, elongated; long antenna, with the first segment red; head large; petiole scale long, gaster small.
Rufescens elongata; antennis longis, primo articulo rufo; capite magno; squam elongata; abdomine parvo.
TL 0.007 m - she is rust-red or pale chestnut, almost glabrous, elongated. The antennae are long, of a redddish-yellow, with the first joint of a brighter colour. The head is large, wider than the alitrunk ("corcelet"), almost heart-shaped, convex and rounded posteriorly. The anterior (clypeus) without carinae, and the frontal area with a feeble notch. The mandibles are strong, triangular, concolorous with the body, meeting against each other on the interior border, hooked, with the apices crossing. The eyes are quite large and blackish. The alitrunk is raised, and rounded anteriorly, narrowed in its middle, behind with inequalities in its narrowing; the posterior extremity also is a little raised, rounded and finishing with a slope. The (petiole) scale is cuneiform and elongated towards the apex; there is a quite large gap between the scale and the gaster, which is small and near round. The legs are long, pale yellowish-red.
This species lives in Senegal. Specimen in the national Museum of Natural History".

Bolton (1995: 298) shows longinoda as reduced to a junior synonym of virescens (i.e. smaragdina) by F Smith (1858b: 29) but resurrected to species by Dalla Torre (1893: 176). Dalla Torre's contribution was solely to catalogue species and there was no argued knowledge. Dalla Torre cited "Oecophylla longinoda Gerstaecker, v.d.Deceken: Ost-Afrika. Gliedertheiere, 1873, p. 343, n.44". An alternative and earlier reference is Gerstaecker (1871: 354), nominally reporting insects from Zanzibar (as then understood), which include - "Oecophylla longinoda Latr., Hist. nat. d. Fourm. p. 184, pl.XI, fig. 72 (= Form virescens Smith, pars). Von Mombas". Looking at F Smith (1860b: 101), where he wrote on the genus Oecophylla, it appears he had seen only specimens from South Africa. It seems possible that the specimens were of Oecophylla textor, which I suggest as probably a distinct species closer to smaragdina than to the type longinoda].

Andre's (1890) description of the minor worker, thinking it was a distinct species, Oecophylla brevinodis, from among the major workers of "Oecophylla smaragdina" from Sierra Leone, is at .

Wheeler (1922) gave rather a vague description of the typical form. He wrote of differences from smaragdina but one can extract -

The integument is more decidedly opaque; the mandibles are somewhat more coarsely striated, always darker, being concolorous with the posterior portion of the head, at least in the large workers, and especially in the dark varieties. As to the female the wing veins are heavily bordered with dark brown; and the bases of the second and following gastric segments are broader, darker and more sharply marked off; the green portions of the typical female are more olivaceous and less pea-green; and the basal bands of the gaster are more exposed and brownish; the appendages are more brownish. The male (TL 6-6.5 mm) is darker and more blackish. The workers he separated by the key [as above].

Thus, the typical worker is the ferruginous (rust-coloured) form. On size variation Wheeler is somewhat vague, writing - "In the worker the polymorphism is greater [than smaragdina], for not only do the individuals of the same colony show a greater range in size (from 3 to 9 mm) but the minimae differ more from the mediae and maximae in the shape of the thorax and petiole".

In Nigeria the only form I ever saw was of what I take as the typical variety; these are shown in my drawing and the enlargement of my photograph of a nest in a cocoa tree.

DESCRIPTION - (type form, CRIN Nigeria, Taylor, 1978: 33) dimorphic, with a subsidiary polymorphy within the major form of, at least, some varieties.
Major worker - TL 8.04 mm, HL 1.71, HW 1.62, SL 2.49, PW 0.93
Minor worker - TL 4.56 mm, HL 1.09, HW 1.06, SL 0.96, PW 0.59

Gotwald (1973) examined the mouthparts of major workers from Ghana, see . The general features of the head mouthparts in his illustrations (Fig. 1 & 5) match those of what I regard as the type form.

The photomontages are of specimens collected in Cameroun - south-western tropical coastal forest area between Edéa and Campo (McKey Wolbachia project) - Cameroon 01 from location Ebodjé, 24 March 2001, on plants near the beach. Note the close-up of the head surface texture which has no sculpturation other than the fine micro-reticulation, whereas the possible claridens (Cameroon 56) has distinct but scattered shallow pits.

Minima -

Oecophylla longinoda pale variety Cameroon 56 - possibly claridens

The photographed specimens were collected in Cameroun - south-western tropical coastal forest area between Edéa and Campo (McKey Wolbachia project) - Cameroon 56 from location EBO, 10 April 2001, on a lianescent plant. Note the close-up of the head surface texture which has distinct but scattered shallow pits, whereas the type form (assumed) has no sculpturation other than the fine micro-reticulation.

The photographed specimens were collected in Cameroun - south-western tropical coastal forest area between Edéa and Campo (McKey Wolbachia project) - Cameroon 79 from location BOU, 18 April 2001, on plants.