Papyrius nitidus
2 Shining Coconut Ant at Red Hill, ACT
Identify this sighting
| Papyrius nitidus | JonLewis | 10 Jun 2019 | |
| Papyrius nitidus | JonSteinbeck | 10 Jun 2019 | |
| Papyrius nitidus | JonSteinbeck | 4 Jun 2019 |
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User's notes
I believe this is a nest of Coconut Ants. It was in a burnt out log that was lying on its side on the southern side of Red Hill.
7 comments
5 Jun 2019
Hi BirdsinCanberra, did you smell the ants? Was the nest in a fairly open site the sun could get into, or a more closed, forest site which would have been quite shady? Cheers, Jon
6 Jun 2019
Hi Jon, Sorry, I could not see any ants on the surface and I did not want to dig into the material to disturb them. The tree cover was patchy, so reasonably open. I hope that helps. Cheers
6 Jun 2019
If you knock on the wood you should get a few ants to appear. That avoids disturbing the material of the nest.
7 Jun 2019
Hi Mike, Many thanks for the tip. I will head back out on Saturday morning to see if I can confirm the ants. Cheers
11 Jun 2019
Hi Jon, I went out again. I knocked on the log, unfortunately I dislodged a bit of bark, but it meant I did get a definite coconut smell. I was able to photograph the ants, and I remembered to include a ruler in the photographs to help with sizing. The final photograph shows the nest in the overall setting.
11 Jun 2019
Hi Birds in Canberra, thanks very much for going out again, and getting the extra photos. No doubt about it now! Particularly appreciate the context photo, as it's good to see what sort of site the nest is in. Cheers, Jon
Location information
- Maps Red Hill Nature Reserve
- Places Red Hill, ACT
Sighting information
- 16 - 100 Abundance
- JonSteinbeck Recorded by
- 5mm to 12mm Animal size
Collections
- BIrdsinCanberra Canberra & Southern Tablelands NatureMapr Papyrius nitidus Ants (Hymenoptera, Formicidae) Insects
Species information
- Papyrius nitidus Scientific name
- Shining Coconut Ant Common name
- Sensitive
- Local native
- Non-invasive or negligible
- Up to 860.96m Recorded at altitude
- External link More information
Record quality
Quality score
7 / 7
- Images or audio
- More than one media file
- Verified by an expert moderator
- Nearby sighting(s) of same species
- GPS evidence of location
- Description
- Additional attributes