Evolutionary arms race in ant-ant mimicry: Camponotus lateralis lags behind in mimicking color patterns and sizes of regional Crematogaster models
Journal: Scientific Reports
Year: 2025

Over a century ago, biologists proposed the Mediterranean ant Camponotus lateralis mimicked the coloration of the common and unpalatable ant Crematogaster scutellaris. A more recent hypothesis suggested that Ca. lateralis also mimicked the color of two additional models, Cr. schmidti and Cr. ionia, in their respective range. This study aims to test the hypothesis using red-green-blue values of 573 model and 957 mimic individuals and whether also size is affected by mimicry. The results support t