Ant Identification
 

For the past several months I've seen an ant around my house that I've never
seen before and I haven't been able to find on the web. It is a large ant,
1/4" to 3/8" in length and looks much like a "ghost ant" that I've found in
searches (but ghost ants are quite small) -- dark brown to black head almost
translucent thorax and dark brown abdomen. The ant is nocturnal and seems to
be able to colonize underground or above ground -- such as one colony did
under a piece of lumber on my patio. Colonies seem to contain a small number
of ants -- maybe 100-150 in number. They don't seem to be damaging anything
but I want to be sure!