ABSTRACT
Ants of the genus Solenopsis are among the most thoroughly studied because of their enormous medical and agricultural impact on the environment (Lofgren and Adams 1982). It is surprising, however, to see how few reports deal with morphology and development of the exocrine glands, even though these few are well-known, forming the basis for social communication (Vander Meer 1983), and hence for most interindividual interactions. The existing contributions on glandular morphology refer to the cephalic glands, organs whose function is mostly digestive (Phillips and Vinson 1980; Petralia et al. 1980). Therefore, morphological data dealing with pheromone-producing glands are limited, in contrast to the many chemical and behavioral studies of the pheromonal secretions themselves.
