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Ants | Fun Facts About The Mysterious World Of Ants
Ants are considered to be one of the common insects found everywhere on earth. Apart from this, ants thrive best in warm climates and become inactive during winter. Most of their species live in tropical forests and make up more than half of the population of all insects.
The size of ant species looks similar. But ants vary in size, behavior, diet. Among these, worker ants are considered to be the most hardworking ants because they collect food, build the walls of the ant colony and keep the queen ant well fed and safe.
Worker ants build their colony by mixing soil and saliva and joining them together to form strong walls. Apart from this, ants are social and the population of their colonies is found to be different. Some species of ants on earth live together in dozens and some in thousands.
Small colonies of ants are found in the cracks of rocks, barks of trees. Large colonies of ants are built in the form of huge nests. Ants spend most of their day searching for food. Such supercolonies can mostly be seen in the United States, Japan, Australia and Southern Europe. Let's know about the mysterious world of ants and start this article,
Where Are Ants Found
Ants are found on all continents except Antarctica. In places like Greenland, there are no native ant species but some species have arrived there with humans. Ant species live in forests, mountains, moldy and damp woods.
Carpenter ants are considered to be one of the most common ants found around the world and prefer wet environments. Ants build their nests in any moldy, wet or damp wood including firewood and tree stumps. Odorous house ants are named after the coconut-like smell that these ants give off when crushed.
This species of ants native to the Americas builds nests near houses. Being more social insects of the Formicidae family, ants live in huge colonies. This species of ants builds nests in open soil, wall cracks, under stones, inside logs, debris and similar things.
Pavement ants or sugar ants get their name from their favorite nesting sites in pavement cracks and are mostly seen in the United States and Canada. One nesting site has 3 to 4 thousand worker ants and several queens in their colony. Red ants mostly prefer to live outdoors and are found in parks, fields, grasslands and foundation sites.
Scientific Name Of Ants
The scientific name of ants is Formicidae and ants are small insects. Ants are social insects. Apart from this, all ants belong to the Formicidae family and Insecta class. There are many types of ants found in the world like fire ants, velvet ants, panda ants and army ants.
The sting of bullet ants living in the Amazon forest is the most painful. Ants are considered a symbol of good luck which symbolizes hard work, teamwork and discipline. You will be surprised to know that ants do not have ears and cannot hear. Ants sense sound by feeling vibrations with their feet. Read- mosquito | Interesting Facts About Disease-Carrying Insects
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Ant Habitat
These social ants living in colonies build nests to lay eggs and keep the queen ants safe. Worker ants work extremely hard to find food and gather material to build the nest while the queen ants are tasked with laying eggs.
Plants, holes in rocks, damp ground, anything can be the ground for ant nests. In colder regions, ants become inactive during winter time so they gather food during the warmer months and stay in their nests throughout the cold season. Ant species in the tropics and other warm climates are active all year round.
Colonies of ants found in Argentina are mostly built in wet environments. The ants live in huge colonies and prefer to stay close to food. This species builds shallow nests in damp places outside and pavement ants mostly prefer to build colonies under cement or rock slabs, patios, hollow foundation walls.
There are about 20 species of ants that live their lives in two different phases called nomadic and stationary. Interestingly, during the nomadic phase which mostly lasts during the day, these ants attack other ant colonies for food. When it is dark, they build a temporary nest to rest.
These ants remain stationary only for a short time when the queen ant lays eggs. To protect the queen, the worker ants of the colony build a nest with their bodies and collect food and wait for the eggs to hatch.
Carpenter ants get their name due to their fondness for building nests in wood. Each colony of carpenter ants has a fertilized queen. She starts building the new nest and raises the initial group of worker ants. While doing this, she never leaves the nest and feeds her saliva to the worker ants. Once the first batch of worker ants is ready, they look for food, build new nests and protect them. The colony grows to more than two thousand worker ants.
Ants never live a solitary life and the colony of ants can be small or large. Each colony has three types of ants which include queen, female workers and male ants. Flying ants are regular ants with wings. The main difference between the queen and male and female workers is in the presence of wings. Only the queen and male ants have wings and female workers do not have wings.
Only the queen ants lay eggs in each ant colony. The main function of male ants is to mate with future queen ants. The males die soon after mating. Once an adult, the queen spends her life laying eggs.
What Do Ants Look Like
Different species of ants look different. The common feature that can help identify them is the narrowing between the abdomen and the thorax. It looks like a thin waist. The body of the ant is covered with a hard exoskeleton that protects the ants.
Ants are mostly black or red. Ants have six legs. They each have three joints. A large head with compound eyes is attached to the body. There are two elbowed antennae. Most ants have powerful jaws that it can use to bite when threatened and ants do not have ears.
Length And Weight Of Ants
A typical ant is small with a body length of about 0.08 inches. Ants are small insects with a body weight of only 1-5 milligrams.
What Do Ants Eat
Ants are omnivorous insects. Their diet consists of fruits, aphids' milk, small insects, plant sap and insect eggs. You will be surprised to know that ants can lift 100 times more weight than their body weight.
Argentine ants love to eat anything sweet, including meat, eggs and fat. While searching for food, Argentine ants leave chemicals called pheromones everywhere so that other ants do not waste their time by visiting the area again. Read- Crowned Eagle | This Is The Fifth Largest Eagle In The World
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How Ants Reproduce
Only the queen has the privilege of laying eggs in an ant colony. Other female ants are small in size, wingless and sterile. Female ants also known as female workers look after the eggs, care for the larvae once they hatch. They act as soldiers, build nests and look for food.
Female ants are born from fertilized eggs and male ants develop from unfertilized eggs. Males mate with the queen to fertilize her eggs. Males are winged ants and live for ten to fifteen days after mating. Males are smaller than worker ants. Males can be identified by their long antennae.
The four stages of an ant life cycle are egg, larva, pupa and adult ant. A single queen can lay up to 300,000 eggs in a matter of days. The eggs hatch into larvae within a few days after being laid by the queen ant. The larvae are fed and groomed by the female worker ants of the colony. They then go through the pupal stage for about a week and emerge as an adult ant in the next stage.
How Long Do Ants Live
Depending on their species, ants can live from several weeks to several years. Some queen ants can live up to 15 years and produce millions of offspring in their lifetime.
How Fast Can Ants Run
The fastest ant species in the world is the Saharan silver ant, which lives in the desert, and can move at speeds of up to 200 meters per second.
How Do Ants Communicate
Ants do not have ears and do not make sounds. Ants communicate using chemicals or pheromones. This can alert each other to danger or lead them to food sources. Ants use pheromones to locate their nests and to detect the location of other ant nests.
How Many Ants Are There In The World
There are more than one million billion ants of more than 1,200 species around the world. Ant populations may be the most numerous, but some species are at risk of extinction.
Most species have stable populations and are of least concern. The black-backed meadow ant is an endangered species in the United Kingdom. The black bog ant and the narrow-headed ant are also endangered species according to the GB Red List.
Behavior Of Ants
Almost all ants can bite. Ants pierce the skin using their mandibles and inflict painful stings. But ant bites are mostly not dangerous. Ants are often considered pests and dangerous.
According to the National Pest Management Association, ants are a concern for many American families. The National Pest Management Association advises people to control ant infestations before they get out of control. Ants are small insects that live in colonies and are not good pets.
Ants Facts For Kids
1. What is the real name of ant?
The scientific name of ants is Formicidae and is named after their scientific family. The Formicidae family is considered part of the larger order of Hymenoptera and also includes bees, wasps and sawflies.
2. What is an ant for kids?
Ants are small insects that can be seen all over the world and are known for lifting objects much heavier than themselves. Ants are social insects and live in organized communities in which they work efficiently, have a clear division of labor, wage war and also capture slaves.
3. Do ants have a heart?
They do not have a heart like us or other mammals.
4. Do ants sleep?
Yes, ants sleep but not in the sense in which we understand sleep. Ants have a cyclical pattern of rest periods that each nest observes as a group, lasting about 8 minutes in any 12-hour period.
5. What do ants eat?
The ants' diet also consists of fruit, aphids' milk, small insects, plant sap, and insect eggs.
6. Are ants male or female?
Every ant colony has one or more queen ants and even though worker ants are female, the queen is the only ant that can lay eggs.
7. What color is ant blood?
Insect blood is mostly yellow or green and this is because insects do not have red blood cells. Their blood hemolymph does not flow through blood vessels like veins, arteries and capillaries. Instead it fills the insect's body cavity and is pushed around by the insect's heart.
8. Can ants fly?
These winged ants, along with queen ants and male ants, fly out of their nests to mate and start new colonies.
9. How do ants get pregnant?
Queen ants never mate again once they have mated once. Instead of mating repeatedly, the queen ant stores the male's sperm in a special sac until she opens the sac to allow the sperm to fertilize the eggs she has produced. After mating, the queen and male ants lose their wings.
10. Length of Ants
A typical ant is small with a body length of about 0.08 inches. Ants are tiny insects with a body weight of only 1-5 milligrams.