In this paper, we provide numeric morphology-based evidence that the dark-colored
Ponera coarctata var. lucida Emery, 1898, formerly considered a synonym ofP.
coarctata(Latreille, 1802), is conspecific with the lighter-coloredPonera
testaceaEmery, 1895. Species hypotheses are developed via NC-PART clustering,
combined with Partitioning Algorithm based on Recursive Thresholding (PART), and via
PCA combined with gap statistics. We obtained our results from an extensive dataset
from the 10 continuous morphometric traits measured on 165 workers belonging to 73
nest samples. Linear discriminant analysis (LDA) confirmed the grouping of hypotheses
generated by exploratory analyses with 100% classification success when all ten morphometric
traits were involved. The Anatolian Turkish black and the predominantly European yellow
samples, did not separate based on their morphometric characteristics. These two color
variations broadly overlap in their geographic range in Anatolian Turkey. The investigated
type series of Ponera coarctata var. lucida Emery, 1898 (collected from Kazakhstan)
fell within theP. testaceacluster instead ofP.
coarctataand is also classified with high certainty asP.
testaceaby confirmatory LDA. Therefore, we propose the synonymy of Ponera
coarctata var. lucida Emery, 1898 withPonera testaceaEmery,
1895. As no other morphological differences than color patterns were detected between
the “black” and “pale”P. testaceasamples, we hold that
these populations constitute geographically occurring color variations of the same
species. Finally, our quantitative morphology-based results show that relying on color
patterns is not a robust approach in identifying EuropeanPonerasamples,
particularly in the east, but using multivariate analyses of morphometric traits is
advised instead.
