Comparative morphological study of Tetramorium caespitum (Linné, 1758) and Tetramorium semilaeve André, 1881 (Hym., Formicidae)

Abstract

The discrimination between T. cuespitum and T. semilaeve is one of the many taxonomical problems within the genus Teframorium in the Iberian peninsula. The aim of this work is to support the results obtained in previous studies on this genus, trying to make thein to some extent objective and to offer new criteria of discrimination. The morphology of both species was quantified at individual and colonial levels. Correspondence Analysis and Stepwise Discriminant Analysis were applied to the data. The segregation results for the latter improve to perfect discrimination when using average data from colony samples.