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Home » Guide » Arthropods (Arthropoda) » Hexapods (Hexapoda) » Insects (Insecta) » Ants, Bees, Wasps and Sawflies (Hymenoptera) » Aculeata - Ants, Bees and Stinging Wasps » Ants (Formicoidea) » Ants (Formicidae) » Formicinae » Lasiini » Honeypot Ants (Myrmecocystus) » subgenus Myrmecocystus (Myrmecocystus subgenus Myrmecocystus) » Myrmecocystus mexicanus
Photo#567398
honeypot ants - Myrmecocystus mexicanus - female
Copyright © 2011 James C. Trager

honeypot ants - Myrmecocystus mexicanus - Female
near Portal, Cochise County, Arizona, USA
August 8, 2011
Size: 10 mm
These two were excavated during one of the field trips of the 10-day Ant Course at SWRS.
Note the different color of the crop contents. Students and faculty, including a vegan or two, tasted them. The lighter one is probably a mixture of honeydew and insect haemolymph (Yech, not so tasty), and the darker one is perhaps creosote extrafloral nectar or honeydew from scale insects on creosote (delicious, citrusy).

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honeypot ants - Myrmecocystus mexicanus - female honeypot ants - Myrmecocystus mexicanus - female
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Contributed by James C. Trager on 23 August, 2011 - 1:11pm
Last updated 25 August, 2011 - 6:54am

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