How do ants live?

Ants are tiny, but together they form real cities. They live almost everywhere and there are more than twelve thousand species. Teamwork is their big secret. How do they organize themselves?

An organized colony

An ant colony can have anything from a few dozen to millions of individuals. There are one or more queens, who lay the eggs, and workers, who do almost all the work. Some colonies also have soldiers with big jaws to defend them.

Sharing the work

Some workers look for food, others take care of the eggs and larvae, others build and clean the nest and others defend it. Nobody gives them orders: each one knows what to do at every moment.

Talking with smells

Ants communicate with chemicals called pheromones. When one finds food, it returns to the nest leaving a scent trail and the others follow it in a line.

Super strong

An ant can carry objects that weigh between ten and fifty times more than itself. For a person, that would be like lifting several tons.

The anthill

They live in tunnels and chambers underground, in logs or in mounds. They have rooms for storing food, raising larvae and resting.

Small but useful

Ants aerate the soil, spread seeds and eat other insects, so they help keep the ecosystem healthy.

A fun fact

Some ants grow fungus inside the nest; others look after aphids to collect their sweet secretion, like tiny farmers. And army ants travel in huge columns.

Activity: follow the trail

Put a small crumb of bread on the ground and watch, from a distance and with patience, how the ants find it and carry it away. Do not disturb them: they are working!

Something to think about

No single ant knows the whole plan of the colony, yet together they manage to build, feed and defend themselves. Scientists study their behavior to design robots that work together and to find shorter routes in transport networks.