Ant colony

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Walter R. Tschinkel next to a plaster cast of a Pogonomyrmex badius nest Walter R. Tschinkel and Pogonomyrmex badius nest cast.jpg
Walter R. Tschinkel next to a plaster cast of a Pogonomyrmex badius nest
Ant hill and ant tracks, Oxley Wild Rivers National Park, New South Wales Ant nest.JPG
Ant hill and ant tracks, Oxley Wild Rivers National Park, New South Wales

An ant colony is a population of ants, typically from a single species, capable of maintaining their complete lifecycle. Ant colonies are eusocial, communal, and efficiently organized and are very much like those found in other social Hymenoptera, though the various groups of these developed sociality independently through convergent evolution. [1] The typical colony consists of one or more egg-laying queens, numerous sterile females (workers, soldiers) and, seasonally, many winged sexual males and females. [2] In order to establish new colonies, ants undertake flights that occur at species-characteristic times of the day. [3] Swarms of the winged sexuals (known as alates) depart the nest in search of other nests. [4] The males die shortly thereafter, along with most of the females. [5] A small percentage of the females survive to initiate new nests. [6]

Contents

Names

The term "ant colony" refers to a population of workers, reproductive individuals, and brood that live together, cooperate, and treat one another non-aggressively. Often this comprises the genetically related progeny from a single queen, although this is not universal across ants. [6] The name "ant farm" is commonly given to ant nests that are kept in formicaria, isolated from their natural habitat. These formicaria are formed so scientists can study by rearing or temporarily maintaining them. [7] [8] Another name is "formicary", which derives from the Medieval Latin word formīcārium. The word also derives from formica. [9] "Ant nests" are the physical spaces in which the ants live. These can be underground, in trees, under rocks, or even inside a single acorn. [6] The name "anthill" (or "ant hill") applies to aboveground nests where the workers pile sand or soil outside the entrance, forming a large mound. [10]

Colony size

Colony size (the number of individuals that make up the colony) is very important to ants: it can affect how they forage, how they defend their nests, how they mate, and even their physical appearances. Body size is often seen as the most important factor in shaping the natural history[ clarification needed ] of non-colonial organisms; similarly, colony size is key in influencing how colonial organisms are collectively organized. [11] [6] Colonies have a significant range of sizes: some are just several[ clarification needed ] ants living in a twig, while others are super-colonies with many millions of workers. Within a single ant colony, seasonal variation may be huge. For example, in the ant Dolichoderus mariae , one colony can shift from around 300 workers in the summer to over 2,000 workers per queen in the winter. [12] Genetics and environmental factors can cause the variation among different colonies of a single species to be even bigger. Different ant species, even those in the same genus, may have enormous colony size disparities: Formica yessensis has colony sizes that are reported to be 306 million workers while Formica fusca colonies sometimes comprise only 500 workers. [11]

Supercolonies

A supercolony occurs when many ant colonies over a large area unite. They still continue to recognize genetic differences in order to mate, but the different colonies within the super colony avoid aggression. [13] Until 2000, the largest known ant supercolony was on the Ishikari coast of Hokkaidō, Japan. The colony was estimated to contain 306 million worker ants and one million queen ants living in 45,000 nests interconnected by underground passages over an area of 2.7 km2 (670 acres). [14] In 2000, an enormous supercolony of Argentine ants was found in Southern Europe (report published in 2002). [15] Of 33 ant populations tested along the 6,004-kilometre (3,731 mi) stretch along the Mediterranean and Atlantic coasts in Southern Europe, 30 belonged to one supercolony with estimated millions of nests and billions of workers, interspersed with three populations of another supercolony. [15] The researchers claim that this case of unicoloniality cannot be explained by loss of their genetic diversity due to the genetic bottleneck of the imported ants. [15] In 2009, it was demonstrated that the largest Japanese, Californian and European Argentine ant supercolonies were in fact part of a single global "megacolony". [16] This intercontinental megacolony represents the most populous recorded animal society on earth, other than humans.[ citation needed ]

Another supercolony, measuring approximately 100 km (62 mi) wide, was found beneath Melbourne, Australia in 2004. [17]

Organizational terminology

The following terminology is commonly used among myrmecologists to describe the behaviors demonstrated by ants when founding and organizing colonies: [6] : p. 209 

Monogyny
Establishment of an ant colony under a single egg-laying queen.
Polygyny
Establishment of an ant colony under multiple egg-laying queens.
Oligogyny
Establishment of a polygynous colony where the multiple egg-laying queens remain far apart from one another in the nest.
Haplometrosis
Establishment of a colony by a single queen.
Pleometrosis
Establishment of a colony by multiple queens.
Monodomy
Establishment of a colony at a single nest site.
Polydomy
Establishment of a colony across multiple nest sites.

Colony structure

Ant colonies have a complex social structure. Ants’ jobs are determined and can be changed by age. As ants grow older their jobs move them farther from the queen, or center of the colony. Younger ants work within the nest protecting the queen and young. Sometimes, a queen is not present and is replaced by egg-laying workers. These worker ants can only lay haploid eggs producing sterile offspring. [18] Despite the title of queen, she does not delegate the tasks to the worker ants; however, the ants choose their tasks based on individual preference. [2] Ants as a colony also work as a collective "super mind". Ants can compare areas and solve complex problems by using information gained by each member of the colony to find the best nesting site or to find food. [2] Some social-parasitic species of ants, known as the slave-making ant, raid and steal larvae from neighboring colonies. [19]

Excavation

Ant hill art is a growing collecting hobby. It involves pouring molten metal (typically non-toxic zinc or aluminum), plaster or cement down an ant colony mound acting as a mold and upon hardening, one excavates the resulting structure. [20] In some cases, this involves a great deal of digging. [21]

The casts are often used for research and education purposes, but many are simply given or sold to natural history museums, or sold as folk art or as souvenirs. Walter R. Tschinkel notes in Ant Architecture: The Wonder, Beauty, and Science of Underground Nests that many commercial operations seem to use a casting procedure he developed and published based on the work of Brazilian myrmecologists Meinhard Jacoby and Luiz Forti. Usually, the hills are chosen after the ants have abandoned so as to not kill any ants; however in the Southeast United States, pouring into an active colony of invasive fire ants is a novel way to eliminate them.[ citation needed ]

Ant-beds

Nest construction of ants

An ant-bed, in its simplest form, is a pile of soil, sand, pine needles, manure, urine, or clay or a composite of these and other materials that build up at the entrances of the subterranean dwellings of ant colonies as they are excavated. [22] A colony is built and maintained by legions of worker ants, who carry tiny bits of dirt and pebbles in their mandibles and deposit them near the exit of the colony. [23] They normally deposit the dirt or vegetation at the top of the hill to prevent it from sliding back into the colony, but in some species, they actively sculpt the materials into specific shapes and may create nest chambers within the mound.[ citation needed ]

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ant</span> Family of insects

Ants are eusocial insects of the family Formicidae and, along with the related wasps and bees, belong to the order Hymenoptera. Ants evolved from vespoid wasp ancestors in the Cretaceous period. More than 13,800 of an estimated total of 22,000 species have been classified. They are easily identified by their geniculate (elbowed) antennae and the distinctive node-like structure that forms their slender waists.

<i>Formica exsecta</i> Species of ant

Formica exsecta is a species of ant found from Western Europe to Asia.

<i>Formica rufa</i> species group Group of ants

The Formica rufa group is a subgeneric group within the genus Formica, first proposed by William Morton Wheeler. This group contains the mound-building species of Formica commonly termed "wood ants" or "thatch-mound ants", which build prominent nests consisting of a mound of grass, litter, or conifer needles. The species Formica rufa or the red wood ant is the type species of this subgroup.

<i>Formica rufa</i> Species of ant

Formica rufa, also known as the red wood ant, southern wood ant, or horse ant, is a boreal member of the Formica rufa group of ants, and is the type species for that group, being described already by Linnaeus. It is native to Eurasia, with a recorded distribution stretching from the middle of Scandinavia to the northern Iberia and Anatolia, and from Great Britain to Lake Baikal, with unconfirmed reportings of it also to the Russian Far East. There are claims that it can be found in North America, but this is not confirmed in specialised literature, and no recent publication where North American wood ants are listed mentions it as present, while records from North America are all listed as dubious or unconfirmed in a record compilation. The workers' heads and thoraces are colored red and the abdomen brownish-black, usually with dark patches on the head and promensonotum, although some individuals may be more uniform reddish and even have some red on the part of the gaster facing the body. In order to separate them from closely related species, specimens needs to be inspected under magnification, where difference in hairiness are among the telling characteristics, with Formica rufa being hairier than per example Formica polyctena but less hairy than Formica lugubris. Workers are polymorphic, measuring 4.5–9 mm in length. They have large mandibles, and like many other ant species, they are able to spray formic acid from their abdomens as a defence. Formic acid was first extracted in 1671 by the English naturalist John Ray by distilling a large number of crushed ants of this species. Adult wood ants primarily feed on honeydew from aphids. Some groups form large networks of connected nests with multiple queen colonies, while others have single-queen colonies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Pharaoh ant</span> Species of ant

The pharaoh ant is a small (2 mm) yellow or light brown, almost transparent ant notorious for being a major indoor nuisance pest, especially in hospitals. A cryptogenic species, it has now been introduced to virtually every area of the world, including Europe, the Americas, Australasia and Southeast Asia. It is a major pest in the United States, Australia, and Europe. The ant's common name is possibly derived from the mistaken belief that it was one of the Egyptian (pharaonic) plagues.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Army ant</span> Name used for several ant species

The name army ant (or legionary ant or marabunta) is applied to over 200 ant species in different lineages. Because of their aggressive predatory foraging groups, known as "raids", a huge number of ants forage simultaneously over a limited area.

<i>Nothomyrmecia</i> Genus of ants

Nothomyrmecia, also known as the dinosaur ant or dawn ant, is an extremely rare genus of ants consisting of a single species, Nothomyrmecia macrops. These ants live in South Australia, nesting in old-growth mallee woodland and Eucalyptus woodland. The full distribution of Nothomyrmecia has never been assessed, and it is unknown how widespread the species truly is; its potential range may be wider if it does favour old-growth mallee woodland. Possible threats to its survival include habitat destruction and climate change. Nothomyrmecia is most active when it is cold because workers encounter fewer competitors and predators such as Camponotus and Iridomyrmex, and it also increases hunting success. Thus, the increase of temperature may prevent them from foraging and very few areas would be suitable for the ant to live in. As a result, the IUCN lists the ant as Critically Endangered.

<i>Iridomyrmex</i> Genus of ants

Iridomyrmex is a genus of ants called rainbow ants first described by Austrian entomologist Gustav Mayr in 1862. He placed the genus in the subfamily Dolichoderinae of the family Formicidae. It has 79 described species and five fossil species. Most of these ants are native to Australia; others are found in Asia and Oceania, and they have been introduced to Brazil, New Zealand, and the United Arab Emirates. Fossil species are known from China, France, and the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Meat ant</span> Common Australian ant

The meat ant, also known as the gravel ant or southern meat ant, is a species of ant endemic to Australia. A member of the genus Iridomyrmex in the subfamily Dolichoderinae, it was described by British entomologist Frederick Smith in 1858. The meat ant is associated with many common names due to its appearance, nest-building behaviour and abundance, of which its specific name, purpureus, refers to its coloured appearance. It is among the best-known species of ant found throughout Australia; it occurs in almost all states and territories except for Tasmania. Its enormous distribution, aggression and ecological importance have made this ant a dominant species.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nuptial flight</span> Mating flight of eusocial insects

Nuptial flight is an important phase in the reproduction of most ant, termite, and some bee species. It is also observed in some fly species, such as Rhamphomyia longicauda.

<i>Formica polyctena</i> Species of ant

Formica polyctena is a species of European red wood ant in the genus Formica and large family Formicidae. The species was first described by Arnold Förster in 1850. The latin species name polyctena is from Greek and literally means 'many cattle', referring to the species' habit of farming aphids for honeydew food. It is found in many European countries. It is a eusocial species, that has a distinct caste system of sterile workers and a very small reproductive caste. The ants have a genetic based cue that allow them to identify which other ants are members of their nest and which are foreign individuals. When facing these types of foreign invaders the F. polyctena has a system to activate an alarm. It can release pheromones which can trigger an alarm response in other nearby ants.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Argentine ant</span> Species of ant

The Argentine ant is an ant native to northern Argentina, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia and southern Brazil. This invasive species was inadvertently introduced by humans on a global scale and has become established in many Mediterranean climate areas, including South Africa, New Zealand, Japan, Easter Island, Australia, the Azores, Europe, Hawaii, and the continental United States. Argentine ants are significant pests within agricultural and urban settings, and are documented to cause substantial harm to communities of native arthropods, vertebrates, and plants within their invaded range.

<i>Pheidole megacephala</i> Species of ant

Pheidole megacephala is a species of ant in the subfamily Myrmicinae. It is commonly known as the big-headed ant in the US and the coastal brown ant in Australia. It is a very successful invasive species and is considered a danger to native ants in Australia and other places. It is regarded as one of the world's worst invasive ant species.

<i>Formica obscuripes</i> Species of ant

Formica obscuripes, the western thatching ant, is a species of ant in the family Formicidae. It is native to North America. It produces large mounds covered by small pieces of plant material. The number of adult workers per colony may be as high as 40,000. F. obscuripes feeds upon a number of insect species, consumes nectar from homopterous insects they tend, and occasionally eats plant tissue.

<i>Dolichoderus mariae</i> Species of ant

Dolichoderus mariae is a species of ant in the subfamily Dolichoderinae and is found in North America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Worker policing</span> Insects destroying eggs not laid by queen

Worker policing is a behavior seen in colonies of social hymenopterans whereby worker females eat or remove eggs that have been laid by other workers rather than those laid by a queen. Worker policing ensures that the offspring of the queen will predominate in the group. In certain species of bees, ants and wasps, workers or the queen may also act aggressively towards fertile workers. Worker policing has been suggested as a form of coercion to promote the evolution of altruistic behavior in eusocial insect societies.

<i>Formica truncorum</i> Species of ant

Formica truncorum is a species of wood ant from the genus Formica. It is distributed across a variety of locations worldwide, including central Europe and Japan. Workers can range from 3.5 to 9.0mm and are uniquely characterized by small hairs covering their entire bodies. Like all other ants, F. truncorum is eusocial and demonstrates many cooperative behaviors that are unique to its order. Colonies are either monogynous, with one queen, or polygynous, with many queens, and these two types of colonies differ in many characteristics.

<i>Pogonomyrmex badius</i> Species of harvester ant

Pogonomyrmex badius, or the Florida harvester ant, is a species of harvester ant in the genus Pogonomyrmex. It is the only Pogonomyrmex species found on the east coast of the United States and the only one in North America known to be polymorphic. The Florida Harvester ant is commonly found in Florida scrub and other similar habitats within the Atlantic coastal plain.

This is a glossary of terms used in the descriptions of ants.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ant supercolony</span> Exceptionally large ant colony

An ant supercolony is an exceptionally large ant colony, consisting of a high number of spatially separated but socially connected nests of a single ant species, spread over a large area without territorial borders. Supercolonies are typically polygynous, containing many egg-laying females. Workers and queens from different nests within the same supercolony can freely move among the nests, and all workers cooperate indiscriminately with each other in collecting food and care of the brood, and show no apparent mutual aggressive behavior.

References

  1. ↑ Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences (1999). "Convergent evolution, superefficient teams and tempo in Old and New World army ants". Proceedings of the Royal Society of London. Series B: Biological Sciences. 266 (1429). Royal Society Publishing: 1697–1701. doi:10.1098/rspb.1999.0834. PMC   1690180 .
  2. 1 2 3 "Ant Colony – ASU – Ask A Biologist". askabiologist.asu.edu. 16 April 2010.
  3. ↑ "Seasonal and nocturnal periodicities in ant nuptial flights in the Tropics (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)". ResearchGate. Retrieved 12 October 2017.
  4. ↑ Wilson, E. O. (1957). "The Organization of a Nuptial Flight of the Ant Pheidole Sttarches Wheeler". Psyche: A Journal of Entomology. 64 (2): 46–50. doi: 10.1155/1957/68319 . ISSN   0033-2615.
  5. ↑ Loiácono, Marta; Margaría, Cecilia. "Hymenoptera (Sawflies, Ants, Bees, and Wasps)". Grzimek's Animal Life Encyclopedia. 3 (2): 405–425. Retrieved 8 December 2018.
  6. 1 2 3 4 5 Holldobler, Bert; Wilson, Edward O. (1990). The Ants. Harvard University Press. ISBN   0-674-04075-9.
  7. ↑ "Word Mark: ANT FARM (renewal)". United States Patent and Trademark Office. 8 January 2009. Retrieved 18 January 2014.
  8. ↑ Kennedy, C.H. (1951). "Myrmecological technique. IV. Collecting ants by rearing pupae". The Ohio Journal of Science. 51 (1): 17–20. hdl:1811/3802.
  9. ↑ "Formicary". Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. Retrieved 19 March 2015.
  10. ↑ Claybourne, A. (2013). A Colony of Ants: and Other Insect Groups. Oxford, UK: Raintree Publishers. p. 12. ISBN   978-1-4062-5563-8.
  11. 1 2 Burchill, A. T.; Moreau, C. S. (5 February 2016). "Colony size evolution in ants: macroevolutionary trends". Insectes Sociaux. 63 (2): 291–298. doi:10.1007/s00040-016-0465-3. S2CID   4817407.
  12. ↑ Laskis, Kristina O.; Tschinkel, Walter R. (February 2009). "The Seasonal Natural History of the Ant, Dolichoderus mariae, in Northern Florida". Journal of Insect Science. 9 (2): 2. doi:10.1673/031.009.0201. PMC   3011848 . PMID   19611227.
  13. ↑ Steiner, Florian M.; Schlick-Steiner, Birgit C.; Moder, Karl; Stauffer, Christian; Arthofer, Wolfgang; Buschinger, Alfred; Espadaler, Xavier; Christian, Erhard; Einfinger, Katrin (2007). "Abandoning Aggression but Maintaining Self-Nonself Discrimination as a First Stage in Ant Supercolony Formation". Current Biology. 17 (21): 1903–1907. Bibcode:2007CBio...17.1903S. doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2007.09.061 . PMID   17964165.
  14. ↑ Higashi, S. and K. Yamauchi. "Influence of a Supercolonial Ant Formica (Formica) yessensis Forel on the Distribution of Other Ants in Ishikari Coast". Japanese Journal of Ecology, No. 29, 257–64, 1979.
  15. 1 2 3 Tatiana Giraud, Jes S. Pedersen, and Laurent Kelle. Evolution of supercolonies: The Argentine ants of southern Europe . The National Academy of Sciences, 2002.
  16. ↑ Ant mega-colony takes over world BBC Wednesday, 1 July 2009 10:41 GMT .
  17. ↑ Walker, Matt (1 July 2009). "Ant mega-colony takes over world". BBC Earth News. London: British Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 1 September 2024.
  18. ↑ Peeters, Christian (1 October 1991). "The occurrence of sexual reproduction among ant workers". Biological Journal of the Linnean Society. 44 (2): 141–152. doi:10.1111/j.1095-8312.1991.tb00612.x. ISSN   0024-4066.
  19. ↑ Foitzik, S.; DeHeer, C. J.; Hunjan, D. N.; Herbers, J. M. (7 June 2001). "Coevolution in host-parasite systems: Behavioural strategies of slave-making ants and their hosts". Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences. 268 (1472): 1139–1146. doi:10.1098/rspb.2001.1627. ISSN   0962-8452. PMC   1088719 . PMID   11375101.
  20. ↑ Anthill Art (12 March 2015). "Largest Aluminum Fire Ant Colony Cast So Far (Cast #072)". Archived from the original on 22 December 2021 – via YouTube.
  21. ↑ KYLYKaHYT (24 December 2010). "Giant Ant Hill Excavated". Archived from the original on 22 December 2021 – via YouTube.
  22. ↑ McCook, Henry C. (1877). "Mound-Making Ants of the Alleghenies, Their Architecture and Habits". Transactions of the American Entomological Society. 6: 253–296. doi:10.2307/25076323. hdl: 2027/hvd.32044072277692 . JSTOR   25076323.
  23. ↑ Gordon, Deborah M. (January–February 1995). "The Development of Organization in an Ant Colony". American Scientist. 83 (1): 50–57. Bibcode:1995AmSci..83...50G. JSTOR   29775362.
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