Teachers, are you looking for more instructive materials to share with your students? Carpenter ants get their name because they build their nests in wood. These insects can cause significant damage to your house. There are many types of carpenter ants throughout the U. Each colony is established by a single, fertilized queen. She starts her nest in a cavity in wood, where she raises her first brood of workers.
She feeds them saliva and does not leave the nest or feed herself during this time. When they are ready, those workers then get the job of gathering food to feed the next generation.
Once mature, this first generation of worker ants work to increase the food supply for the colony. The colony population grows very rapidly. A colony can eventually produce 2, or more workers. Carpenter ants do not eat the wood they remove during their nest-building activities, but deposit it outside entrances to the colony in small piles. The diet of carpenter ants includes living and dead insects, meat, fats and sugary foods of all kinds, including honeydew and nectar from plants.
Carpenter ants build nests anywhere they can find water and moldy or damp wood, such as tree stumps, firewood or in the plants around your house. These tunnels weaken the wood and potentially damage the wood that keeps the house standing. This kind of damage can be very expensive to fix. School teachers — are you interested in more ant and insect materials to share with your students?
Find additional information on carpenter ants at the official NPMA website. This ant gets its name from the strong, rotten coconut-like smells it gives off when crushed and the fact that they commonly nest in or around houses. Native to the United States, these ants are very social, living in colonies of up to , members. Typically living for several years, these ants commonly make their homes in exposed soil, under stones, logs, mulch, debris and other items.
They will also nest in wall and floor cracks. Odorous house ants do not pose a health threat, but they can contaminate food by leaving waste behind. Find more educational materials for use in your classroom, including a profile on odorous house ants , at the official NPMA website.
Although these ants can live inside, they get their name because they make their nests in or under cracks in pavement. They are typically found in the eastern half of the United States, California and Washington. Pavement ant colonies average 3, to 4, members and have several queens. These ants will eat almost anything, including insects, grease, seeds, honeydew, honey, bread, meats, nuts and cheese.
This ant gets its name because it most commonly nests in soil next to and beneath slabs, sidewalks, patios, and driveways. Pavement ants do not pose a health threat, but they can contaminate food by leaving waste behind. Find more information on pavement ants to share with the kids in your classroom at the official NPMA website.
Red imported fire ants RIFA, for short are more aggressive than other ant species and have a painful sting. These ants and their telltale mound nests should be actively avoided.
Red imported fire ants can adapt to many climates and conditions in and around their environment. For example, if the colony senses increased water levels in their nests, they will come together and form a huge ball or raft that is able to float on the water! They occasionally enter buildings through holes or cracks in walls and foundations.
The sting of a red imported fire ant is painful and often results in a raised welt that becomes a white blister. Persons allergic to insect stings will react more severely. A cheetah? Apparently a certain ant species holds the record. Thought there was just pavement ants in your area?
There is 1, species of ants currently dwelling in the United States. If an egg is fertilised, a female ant develops. If the egg is left unfertilised, a male ant hatches. After ant eggs hatch, the larvae are raised by the worker ants. The Australian jumping spider disguises itself as a green ant and sneaks into the nest in order to feed on the larvae.
This process is known as chemical mimicry. The evolution of the ant is believed to be due to flowering plants providing more complex ground habitats. This occurred million years ago. Although Hawaii is a detached island, it still has ants! There are currently 50 species of these ants crawling around this island and none of them are native. The queen actually has very little control over the colony. Ants work as a whole colony cognitively.
Most ant species only have one queen per colony, but the red imported fire ant and the Argentine ant have been known to have two. Ants are pretty darn tidy. Worker ants have been known to take rubbish outside the nest to a dumping point! Birds love black ants! They often put them in their feathers, as they secrete formic acid, which eliminates parasites. Honeypot ants are literally living honeypots!
These greedy critters spend their days feasting on food, making their bellies swell into bags of sweet liquid. They then regurgitate this to feed others in the colony. The carpenter ant can self destruct to save others! It contracts its body to rupture their gland and spray toxic liquid at its enemies.
There is a species of vampire ant! They live in Madagascar and feed by biting holes into their larvae and drinking their blood. A larvae will become a queen if it is well nourished and its parent is of a sexually reproductive colony. Ants are also in the mining business! In Arizona, ants find garnets and drag them to the surface.
When an ant dies, it releases a chemical that communicates to the other ants to move it to a burial ground. A skydiver was saved by ants! Joan Murray landed on a fire ant nest and the shocks the ants gave her kept her heart beating.
East African Indigenous tribes use ants in medicine. They get the ant to produce two bites on either side of a cut to help it heal. Some say that the bite of a bullet ant is as painful as being shot.
Forget human zombies, ant zombies actually exist! This is caused by a type of fungus that infects the ants and takes control of them. Luckily, ants can sense this and often kill the infected colony member. Learn More. Please click here or call for Holiday Hours. There are a whopping 12, species of ants on our planet. They have a larger muscle to body ratio than humans. It is believed that ants have existed on this planet for million years.
They have had agriculture longer than human beings! They forage by following other ants trails of pheromones to food sources. Image if that bit you on the bum! Plus, they can send chemical signals called pheremones released through their body to send messages to other ants! Found in Argentina in , the ginormous colony housed 33 ant populations which had merged into one giant supercolony , with millions of nests and billions of workers!
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