Hi Simone, looking closely at the images, I think there is faint blue & green metallic colour on this ant, which would make it Rytidoponera metallica. Sometimes the metallic colour is very strong but it can often be quite faint. R. tasmaniensis has no metallic colour at all and is a generally brown-looking ant. Did you ID the ant as R. tasmaniensis for a particular reason? Cheers, Jon
Hi Jon, I did feel there was a greenish metallic sheen on the abdomen but not on the rest of the ant. I misinterpreted the description of R. tasmaniensis, as I think it said the body was not metallic, and I assumed for some reason that excluded the abdomen. I’m happy with your ID. Simone
Hi Simone, thanks for the clarification. A good rule of thumb (in our region) is that any Rhytidoponera which has any blue/green metallic colouration on the body is almost always R. metallica. Cheers, Jon
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