#dolichoderinae

[chlorophyll-and-chitin]

Iridomyrmex purpureus on an Acacia sp.

05-SEP-2025

Melton Botanic Gardens, Melbourne, Vic

[alienbath]

The fascinating relationship between ants and aphids. Some species of ants farm aphids, protecting them from predators and eating the liquid they secrete.

(Source: West coast seeds)

[rattyexplores]

Ant Carrying Away a Dead Caterpillar

Unidentified, genus Iridomyrmex

24/03/23 - NSW, Dapto

[drhoz]

#205 - Spider Ant

Leptomyrmex sp. Unusual-lookingDolichoderine ants with long legs and weirdly slender heads.

Spotted this one in my grandparents yard in Uranquinty.

These conspicuous ants are most often encountered individually or as small groups of 2 or 3 foragers on the surface of the ground any time of the day or night. Because of their long legs and thin bodies, they superficially resemble spiders. This is especially true when they are disturbed, as they extend their legs, raise their gasters, and run quickly to escape danger. This has led to their being given the common name "spider ants."

Nests are found in soil or in dead wood, either standing or on the ground, and are often at the base of trees. Colony sizes average a few hundred workers and a single queen. In all but a handful of species, the queen is wingless and worker-like, differing from workers only in being slightly larger and with an enlarged mesosoma. In a few species the queens are fully winged, as they are in most other ants.

When a large source of food is found, workers of Leptomyrmex will return to their nest and recruit additional workers to help utilise the newly found resource. They also use workers as "living storage vessels". These special workers, called repletes, accept liquids from returning foragers who transfer their liquid foods to these selected workers. These special workers continue to accept liquids until their gasters become greatly enlarged and extended. When enlarged, repletes cannot escape the nest and remain inside suspended from the ceiling. They can retain these fluids for extended periods and dispense it on demand when food is in short supply.

[drhoz]

#119 - Meat Ants

Iridomyrmex purpureus - The dominant species of Australia's ant fauna. Indeed, in sheer biomass, they outweigh every other species of animal on the continent.

Small comedies in this shot - two ants squabbling about the best place to put a bit of gravel, and one ant trying to stuff a very large pair of insect legs down the hole. It was like watching a dog with a big stick trying to get through a doorway.

Meat Ants live in underground nests of over 64,000 ants, and frequently in supercolonies that stretches up to 650 meters. Nest holes are regularly arranged, and each leads to a separate series of branched tunnels, which typically do not connect with the tunnels from other holes. Meat ants do not have dedicated soldier and worker castes like some ants. Instead, they exhibit age caste polyethism, meaning they take on different roles in the colony at different ages. Young ants care for eggs and larvae in the nest. Older ants form part of large foraging parties to exploit significant stationary food resources, such as a dead animal or a colony of hemipterous insects. Older ants undertake lone foraging across open ground, predominately collecting invertebrates and "building material". The oldest workers engage in ritual combat along borders between colonies to establish foraging boundaries.

Meat ants are highly aggressive towards other species of ants (and any humans that spend too much time near their nests, which is where I get involved), so are a dominant component of Australian ant communities. Other species employ strategies to exploit resources or habitats not favoured by meat ants, or forage at alternate times (like the common crepuscular Camponotus species).