Ants have often tested humans for self awareness. They placed objects in our homes and were shocked we didn't cover them in sand.
"Although humans build interesting nests & show signs of cooperation, can they really have rich inner lives like ants? Unlikely."
They laid pheromone trails & we ignored them.
"Even a newly eclosed callow or a termite could have followed these trails! Human intelligence is perhaps similar to that of a lichen... or perhaps an aphid at best."
In a case of obligate cross-species cloning, female ants of Messor ibericus need to clone males of Messor structor to obtain sperm for produ
Living organisms are assumed to produce same-species offspring. Here, we report a shift from this norm in Messor ibericus, an ant that lays individuals from two distinct species. In this life cycle, females must clone males of another species because they require their sperm to produce the worker caste. As a result, males from the same mother exhibit distinct genomes and morphologies, as they belong to species that diverged over 5 million years ago. The evolutionary history of this system appears as sexual parasitism that evolved into a natural case of cross-species cloning, resulting in the maintenance of a male-only lineage cloned through distinct species’ ova. We term females exhibiting this reproductive mode as xenoparous, meaning they give birth to other species as part of their life cycle.
Could you please do a Bulldog Ant stimboard but with the most aggressive, batshit insane, stupid stims possible? I'm thinking glass getting shattered, dogs biting at the screen, all that
I've done bulldog ant before but this was too fucking funny to not do 😭
This trip up the north of Thailand, doesn't stop giving me 'bug surprises'. In our last guesthouse I found some "interesting ants" but didn't give them much thought. It was just later when I took out my TG-7 out of my pocket and pointed at them that I noticed the hooks on their thorax and betwren their thorax and abdomen.
They turned out to be polyharchis armata, not that I know much of ants, but I know that these are a species of fish hook ants new to me. Those hooks are a deterrent for predators. Just look at them, who would like to eat something that spicky?!
New anthropomorphized ants. Trying to define what types of clothes they should wear. Right now i'm drawing inspiration from antique civilization that lived where they live, but i'm also very much drawing them without thinking.
I'd like to put more thought into them in the future, if you have a favorite ant specie you'd want me to try and draw i'd love to take some request !
(Updated due to public outcry and political pressure.)
No. 10 - Yellow Crazy Ants
These guys are on a list of "one hundred of the world's worst invasive species" formulated by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), having invaded ecosystems from Hawaii to the Seychelles.
But don't hate just because they are awesome at establishing themselves in a new habitat due to their aggression toward other ant species, lack of aggression toward members of their own species, efficient recruitment, and large colony size. Respect the hustle!
No. 9 - Paraponera Clavata
Also known as the "bullet ant," "the one wounding deeply," or "24-hour ant", referring to the full day of pain that follows being stung.
This ant's sting currently ranks the highest of all insect stings on Justin O. Schmidt's informal sting pain index, at 4.0+. Some victims compared the pain to that of being shot, (hence the nickname,) with "waves of burning, throbbing, all-consuming pain that continues unabated for up to 24 hours."
Lymphadenopathy, edema, tachycardia, and fresh blood appearing in human victim feces are common symptoms from even a single sting.
Un-fuck-with-able.
No. 8 - Honeypot Ants
The name honeypot ant comes from the peculiar development of replete workers, whose abdomens become so swollen with food that they are used by the rest of the colony as living food storage. They are "drained" during famine, usually the wintertime, to sustain the colony, leaving them as "flaccid depletes."
Disgusting. 10/10
When a replete worker fills with food, a portion of her digestive tract swells and displaces other abdominal organs. It can expand about four to five times its normal linear dimension when they are fully engorged with food.
I can relate. I have eaten pasta in such quantities to displace my own organs many times.
No. 7 - Red Imported Fire Ants
Though South American in origin, the red imported fire ant has been accidentally introduced to many other parts of the world.
More than 14 million people are stung by them in the United States annually. Most victims experience intense burning and swelling, followed by the formation of sterile pustules, which may remain for several days. Up to 6% of people may suffer from anaphylaxis. More than 80 deaths have been recorded from red imported fire ant attacks.
These ants thrive in urban areas. Nests can be built under pavements and foundations. This means not only can they damage or destroy individual structures, but red imported fire ants can have an affect on broader infrastructure, damaging land, business and property values. In agriculture, they can damage crops and machinery, and threaten pastures. They also pose a threat to animals and livestock, capable of inflicting serious injury or death, especially on young, weak, or sick animals.
With annual damages estimated in the billions of dollars, these ants are considered the second worst thing to arrive on North American soil since 1492.
No. 6 - Black Garden Ants
When building their colony, these ants will structure it so as to inhibit the transmission of different contagions. Different communities within the colony are segregated by a limited number of connective nodes, allowing for greater protection of vulnerable hive members, such as larvae and pupae.
A trait I could only wish other species performed so well.
No. 5 - Pharaoh Ants
These ants utilize three types of pheromones. One is a long-lasting attractive chemical that is used to build a trail network. It remains detectable even if the ants do not use the trail for several days.
The second pheromone is also attractive, but will decay to imperceptible amounts in a matter of minutes without reapplication. This pheromone is useful in marking food sources as these are unpredictable and liable to change quickly, so not worth the longer-lasting pheremone.
The third pheromone is a repellant. If an individual finds an unprofitable area with little food or significant danger, it will release this repellant pheromone, which will warn others and cause them to look elsewhere. While positive pheromones indicating lucrative foraging sites are very common in social insects, the pharaoh ant's negative pheromone is highly unusual and pharaoh ants were the first species found to employ such a thing.
No. 4 - Argentine Ant
This species is like the Mr. Worldwide of ants. It has established itself in every continent except Antarctica (including many oceanic islands.)
It even has "supercolonies" that extend across hundreds or thousands of kilometers, first reported in California in 2000, then in Europe in 2002, Japan in 2009, and Australia in 2010.
Several subsequent studies used genetic, behavioral, and chemical analyses to show that supercolonies on separate continents actually represent a single global supercolony.
The researchers stated that the "enormous extent of this population is paralleled only by human society."
How can you not admire (and fear) the ambition and the achievement?
No. 3 - Leafcutter Ants
"Leafcutter ants" is a bit of an umbrella term, as it consists of over 45 ant species, but this gang is just so remarkable. Next to humans, leafcutter ants form some of the largest and most complex animal societies on Earth. They are known for their advanced agricultural practices. These ants are not merely foragers but skilled farmers, cultivating their own food by collecting specific kinds of leaf matter in order to produce specialized fungi in their nests.
No. 2 - Formica Fusca
These ants, (sometimes called silky ants or dusky ants,) are fast to learn, and only a single presentation of stimulus is enough for them to form a genuine long-term memory. This formed memory is also resistant to extinction.
Ants of this species can also detect volatile organic compounds emitted by cancer cells. After a 3-trial conditioning, they can differentiate cancer cell lines from healthy ones. They can also differentiate between at least two different cancerous cell lines.
A similar ability to detect human tumours has been shown in more recent studies.
No. 1 - Weaver Ants
An arboreal species, (i.e. they live in trees,) weaver ants are known for their unique nest building behaviour where workers construct nests by weaving together leaves using larval silk. Colonies can be extremely large consisting of more than a hundred nests spanning numerous trees.
How they sew the leaves together is a remarkable feat of cooperation. Typically, dozens of ants will need to form a chain to first bridge a gap between two leaves, then pull them together so another team can hold them in position whilst yet more ants sew the gap together with silk. But adult ants can't make silk, so they have to use larvae to do it, picking the larvae up and using them like little pots of glue to spin a mat of silk between the two leaves. Altogether, a hundred ants might be involved in the same task. This is a pretty remarkable piece of evolution and a testament to the power of cooperation!
