Posted by We find a lot of interesting facts about ants. Although ants might be annoying when they invade your house or when you’re enjoying a picnic, they do have a positive impact on the ecosystem. They are sociable insects, meaning they dwell in huge groups or colonies. Ant colonies can have millions of ants depending on the species. In this article, you will get to know interesting facts about ants, keep reading!
In a colony, there are three types of ants: the queen, female workers, and males. The workers do not have wings, but the queen and males do. Only the queen ant has the ability to lay eggs. The duty of the male ant is to mate with future queen ants, and they don’t survive long after that. The queen, once she reaches adulthood, spends the remainder of her life producing eggs! A colony may have one queen or several queens, depending on the species.
Soldier ants guard the queen, defend the colony, harvest or destroy food, and assault other colonies in quest of food and nesting space in ant colonies. They collect the eggs of the vanquished ant colony if they defeat another ant colony. When the eggs hatch, the young ants become the colony’s “slave” ants. The colony’s responsibilities include caring for the eggs and infants, obtaining food for the colony, and constructing anthills or mounds. Let’s find below 40 interesting facts about ants you didn’t know!
Interesting facts about ants
Here are 40 interesting facts about ants you will learn with fun
1. Ants are the longest-living insects on the planet.
2. In the Amazon Rainforest, fire ant colonies join their legs to form a raft. They may float down rivers and travel through the forest as a result of this.
3. An aunt’s jaws are similar to a pair of scissors in that they open sideways.
4. Ants are really neat. Worker ants have been found to transport garbage to a disposal site outside the colony!
5. Each ant colony has a distinct odor. They’ll be able to detect invaders this way!
6. In order to feed on the larvae, the Australian jumping spider disguises itself as a green ant and creeps into the nest. Chemical mimicry is the term for this process.
7. There are approximately 12,000 different species of ants on the planet.
8. Ants are the insect world’s sheepdogs, herding aphids and guarding them against predators.
9. Ants have the ability to kill! The Australian bulldog ant is the world’s most deadly ant, having killed three people since the 1930s.
10. Ants do not have lungs! Simply put, they have small pores through which oxygen enters and carbon dioxide exits.
11. Nomadic ants are ants that travel from place to place. These wandering insects are army ants, who forage for food and attack rival colonies on their own.
12. Some ant species are known to turn other ant species into slaves. One of two things can cause this. The first method is for a queen ant to travel to a nest of a similar species, kill the current queen, and take over the nest, using her workers to raise her own legs. The second method is for one nest’s workers to kidnap the larvae of another nest and raise them as slaves.
13. The invasive Argentinian ant colony was the world’s largest ant colony, measuring 6000 kilometers (3750 miles) in length. Although there were numerous smaller Argentinian ant colonies, they all united to form one mega colony.
14. The trap-jaw ant, Odontomachus bauri, has been seen closing its jaws at rates of up to 230 kilometers per hour (140 miles per hour). This implies its mouth can exert 300 times its own weight in force.
15. Pheromones are substances that ants use to communicate and collaborate with one another. They’re able to communicate with one another via these substances.
16. The combined weight of all ants on the planet exceeds that of all humans. There are approximately one million ants for every human on the globe. In tropical areas, they can weigh more than all other ground-dwelling animals combined.
17. Ants use vibrations to communicate. They don’t even have ears, to be honest!
18. Soldier ants scavenge eggs from neighboring colonies. The young ants will be exploited as slaves after they hatch.
19. Many ants can survive underwater for 24 hours. When they look like they’ve drowned, the water can evaporate and allow enough oxygen to flow through their spiracles which allows ants to “come back to life.”
20. Some Native American tribes have initiation rites in which young males are forced to be bitten by bullet ants repeatedly.
21. In Mexico, ant eggs are considered a delicacy. The meal, escamoles, seems disgusting but is really rather costly.
22. A male of the species M. smithii has yet to be discovered.
23. They are the first farmers in the world. Agriculture has been practiced by them for longer than it has been practiced by humans!
24. Ants carry around 50 tons of dirt per square mile each year.
25. Ants have antennae that can detect odors! What’s the point of having a nose?
26. The Pharoah ant, which is just 2mm long, is the world’s tiniest ant.
27. Farmers are leafcutter ants! They produce mushrooms by secreting antibiotics, which promote the growth of mold.
28. Driver ants are frightful creatures. These predators hunt in packs, devouring anything in their way. They’ve been known to eat tethered horses as well as human babies.
29. For weeks at a time, ants might go to war with competing colonies.
30. Ants are capable of swimming. Gosh… Is there anything they aren’t capable of?
31. The sting of the bullet ant is the most severe of any insect. Its venom-filled sting can last for up to 24 hours. It’s been likened to sticking your finger in a 240-volt outlet!
32. Green ant colonies in Australia can have nests that span up to twelve trees.
33. Right present, there are over 10,000,000,000,000,000 ants on the planet.
35. The average lifespan of a black garden ant is longer than that of a dog. (15 years old)
36. The bullet ant, which may be found in the Panama rainforest, is the world’s largest ant. These creatures may reach a length of 1.6 inches.
37. The world’s biggest ant’s nest was almost 3,700 miles wide!
38. A fully established colony is more likely to produce wing ants.
39. The Queen’s job is to lay tens of thousands of eggs each year, assuring the colony’s strength and power.
40. Flowering plants are thought to have aided the ant’s development by creating more complex ground habitats. This happened a hundred million years ago.
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