BOOK REVIEW

The Ants of Ohio (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) by Gary A. Coovert. 2003. Bullletin of the Ohio Biological Survey, 15 (2), 196 pp. $ 30.00.

     The price is a bit steep, but the book is useful for anyone wishing to identify ants from Ohio and adjacent states. It is, however, a bit of a mixed bag. There is, for example, nothing on collection, preservation, labeling or documentation. Instead, the user is referred to the quite pricey Agosti, et al. handbook (Agosti, D., Jonathan D. Majer, Leanne E. Alonso, and Ted R. Schultz, editors. 2000. Ants: Standard Methods for Measuring and Monitoring Biodiversity. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C. xix + 280 pp.) Nor are there chapters devoted to general biology and behavior of ants.

     There are the usual - and useful - keys to subfamilies, genera, and species. The latter are up-to-date and work well. Species accounts are pretty thorough, with notes on Identification, Taxonomy (usually with a reference to Creighton 1950 or a more recent treatment), Ecology, Behavior, Nests, Range, and Comments; spot maps for each species show graphically where each taxon has been collected in Ohio.

     For whatever reason, the author uses a couple of out-moded morphological terms. Thus, "occiput" rather than preocciput or posterior margin; and, silliest of all, "alitrunk" rather than mesosoma.

     Some of the nomenclature is deliberately out-of-date: Leptothorax (complete with unjustifiable "subgenera") rather than Temnothorax and Smithistruma rather than Pyramica. Colobopsis, usually treated as a subgroup within Camponotus, is elevated to genus rank, but on rather tenuous grounds. Similarly, Acanthomyops is retained as a genus; I suppose that it could be argued that Ward subsumed it into Lasius too recently to be acknowledged.

     The book is amply illustrated, borrowing many habitus figures from papers by M. R. Smith, but failing to note that these are the work of either Arthur D. Cushman or Sarah H. DeBord. Both of these fine illustrators should have been acknowledged. There are also many habitus figures by the author's wife, Holly K. Coovert. These are often impressive but often the effect is strange, especially the "shadows" beneath the figure. Other figures, such as those of Myrmecina americana (p. 83) or Dolichoderus plagiatus (p. 104) are bizarrely distorted and inaccurate.

     All in all, I would rank this a "B" effort. It could have been an "A" had the manuscript been reviewed by a few ant taxonomists prior to publication. In fact, ant taxonomists get pretty short shrift in the Acknowledgements: none are acknowledged.

Roy R. Snelling,
Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County,
900 Exposition Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90007.
E-mail: antmanrs@nhm.org