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Eciton Army Ants
Eciton
Eciton is a New World army ant genus that contains the most familiar species of army ants. The most predominant and well-known species is Eciton burchellii, which is also more commonly known as "Balichana" in the Colombian Caribbean Coast, but also as the army ant and is considered the type species.
Eciton burchellii and Eciton hamatum are the most visible and best studied of the New World army ants because they forage above ground and during the day, in enormous raiding swarms. Their range stretches from southern Mexico to the northern part of Argentina.
12 branches of this genus, most-observed first
Burchell's Army Ant
speciesEciton burchellii
Eciton hamatum
speciesEciton hamatum
Eciton rapax
speciesEciton rapax
Eciton vagans
speciesEciton vagans
Eciton quadriglume
speciesEciton quadriglume
Eciton dulcium
speciesEciton dulcium
Eciton mexicanum
speciesEciton mexicanum
Eciton lucanoides
speciesEciton lucanoides
Eciton drepanophorum
speciesEciton drepanophorum
Eciton setigaster
speciesEciton setigaster
Eciton jansoni
speciesEciton jansoni
Eciton uncinatum
speciesEciton uncinatum
Where it lives
Recorded sightings
—
geo-referenced records in GBIF, from museums, herbaria and field observers.
Drag the globe to turn it. Dots are where records exist, not a range map; darker means more records.
In the stacks
Searching the stacks…
Every page naming Eciton in the Biodiversity Heritage Library →
This page is assembled live from iNaturalist, GBIF, Wikipedia, the Source Library and the Internet Archive. It is not yet part of the hand-edited codex. iNaturalist taxon 126834.