Forel (1899) reported that the type specimens were collected by A. Alfaro from a rotten log. Kugler collected specimens in Colombia, from a "large nest in rotten log, soil - rocks, under forest" (reported in Brandao 1990).
I have observed modestus numerous times in Costa Rica. It prefers mature wet forest. It appears to be rare at La Selva, but becomes increasingly abundant at higher elevations. At La Selva, I have seen the occasional worker from a sifted litter sample or at a bait on the forest floor, and once I found an isolated worker in the live hollow stem of a live Solanaceous scandent shrub (Witheringia?). At higher elevations above La Selva and in Penas Blancas, I frequently find modestus building soil shelters up trees and under liana stems, where they tend Coccoidea. Colonies are subterranean, can be very large, and may be polygynous.
Colombia, Costa Rica, Panama, Venezuela. Costa Rica: Atlantic slope wet forest.
Taxonomic history
Brandão, 1990b PDF: 426 (q.m.); Boudinot et al., 2013 PDF: 49 (w.q.m.).
