What does the queen do in the anthill. How the anthill works: the internal structure, life and interaction of ants

There is a great quote from Lewis Thomas on this score: “Ants are so much like us humans that it’s even somehow embarrassing. They grow mushrooms, raise aphids as milk cows, send armies of soldiers to war, spray chemicals to scare and confuse the enemy, capture slaves, exploit child labor, and constantly exchange information. In short, they do everything - except that they don’t watch TV ”

This anthill is only in appearance - a bunch of branches and needles, inside it is a real "ant city".

Ants are almost like humans. There is an initial set of qualities: aggressiveness, intelligence, enterprise, speed of reactions, the ability to interact with others. Depending on them, each ant gets his profession.

The queen of ants is the uterus - a sexually mature female. The uterus is able to establish a new anthill. To do this, she digs a small underground corridor, where she later lays her eggs.

Ants have a specialty - a security guard. It is received by those individuals who show aggressiveness early. Of course, they also have intelligence, but not as developed: it is not so important for soldiers to reason - they should rush to protect common resources without any hesitation.

Another profession is honeydew pickers. In a sense, ants have their own pets. Aphids feed on plant sap and secrete drops of a sweetish liquid called honeydew. Mutually beneficial cooperation has been established between ants and aphids. Ants collect honeydew - for them it is tasty and nutritious food, the main source of carbohydrates. And as a return service, they protect their green cows from predators.

There is also a division of labor among honeydew collectors. You can, of course, alone get the treasured drop of sweet liquid and drag it into the anthill yourself. But this is irrational from the point of view of logistics.

Therefore, there are ants that work as shepherds (or milkers): they tickle aphids, providing high milk yields. And the resulting products are transported by others.

Ants carefully monitor the condition of their homes. An average-sized anthill consists of 4–6 million needles and twigs. Every day, hundreds of builder ants carry them from above into the depths of the anthill, and from the lower floors to the top.

This ensures a stable moisture regime of the nest, and therefore the dome of the anthill remains dry after rain, does not rot or become moldy.

Even in the anthill there are hospitals where doctors, for example, surgeons, work. And if one of their inhabitants injured a limb, that is, an arm or a leg, then the surgeons amputate it (bite off).

Also necessarily in the ant family there are "custodians" of nectar. They are needed for that unforeseen case, if there is a famine in the anthill and the worker ants can no longer get food.

Slavery is common in some species. Ants attack someone else's anthill and steal pupae. Raised then in someone else's anthill, the captives work for his good.

Anthill in section

1. A covering of needles and twigs. Protects the dwelling from the vicissitudes of the weather, is repaired and updated by worker ants.

2. "Solarium" - a chamber heated by the rays of the sun. In the spring, the inhabitants come here to warm themselves.

3. One of the entrances. Guarded by soldiers. Serves as a ventilation channel.

4 . "Cemetery". This is where worker ants carry dead brethren and garbage.

5. Winter chamber. Insects gather here to survive the cold in a state of semi-hibernation.

6. "Bread barn". This is where the ants store grain.

7. The royal chamber, where the uterus lives, laying up to one and a half thousand eggs a day. She is cared for by worker ants.

8. Chambers with eggs, larvae and pupae.

9. "Cowshed" where ants contain aphids.

10. "Meat pantry", where foragers bring caterpillars and other prey.

Another thing is surprising: in the ant family, no “think tank” is found that would manage the common efforts to achieve the desired result, be it repairing the anthill, getting food or protecting it from enemies. Moreover, the anatomy of an individual ant - a scout, a worker, or an ant queen - does not allow one to place this "think tank" in an individual ant.

Its physical dimensions are too small nervous system, and the volume of programs and data accumulated by generations necessary to control the life of the anthill is too large.

The Ant Brotherhood teaches us a lesson in tolerance and gives us the basics scientific organization labor
It plows like an ant, we say, imagining a restless insect dragging on its fragile “shoulders” a kind of “log” - a blade of grass ten times longer than itself.

About how complicated everything is arranged in the anthill, we remember biologists from school lessons. But that's how difficult it is, this is told by serious myrmecologists who study the ant society. Having become acquainted with their research, we can safely say: literally under our feet a parallel civilization is boiling and developing.

Ants are the guys on their minds. Let's start with birth. These insects belong to the Hymenoptera, which have everything with sex determination, not like humans. Males develop from unfertilized eggs and contain a single set of chromosomes, while females are endowed with a double set. In this scenario, daughters receive the entire genome from their father, and half from their mother. Sisters turn out to be closer relatives to each other than daughters to their mother.

An ant queen mother, having only one sexual contact, receives a supply of sperm that she spends her whole life - from 12 to 20 years

In many species of Hymenoptera, in such a situation, only founding mothers breed, mating with males admitted to the body, and their daughters remain in “girls” and work all their short lives for the good of their sisters. Their ovipositors, as unnecessary, turn into stingers - personal combat weapons designed for defense and attack.

Entomologists call this behavior kindred altruism: most members of society refuse to breed in the name of supporting close relatives. But you will not envy a workhorse that does not know love. In many species of ants, the family structure is quite simple: this is a female, who met for a few moments with a short-lived male, and several dozen workers - her daughters.

Worker ants cannot compete for females - in fact, they themselves are unfertilized females. But there are hierarchical relations among workers, competition for the right to be in a certain area, competition for a more “prestigious” job, as well as for the right to rest, - explains the well-known scientist, head of the laboratory of behavioral ecology of communities of the Institute of Economics and Life Sciences of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, head of the Department of Comparative Psychology of NSU Professor Zhanna Reznikova. A few years ago in Cambridge (Great Britain) her book “Animal Intelligence” was published, where she explains the structure of the ant brotherhood.

Self-affirmation: “suitcase pose”

To stake out a place under the sun, the ants have to demonstrate a tough temper. They behave like many mammals: they jump on each other, try to rise above the enemy, defiantly walk on high, tense legs, and bite. The winner in the dispute grabs the loser by the mandibular palps and makes him squirm in the “suitcase position”. The victor carries away the crushed enemy from the battlefield, can drag him to the anthill and throw him there, so as not to interfere with his career and not appear on the same site with the winner. By the way, ants love to relax and unwind. Once inside the nest, they literally fall into nirvana - they sleep, swaying slightly on their feet.

Career guidance: not an inch to the enemy

In a small ant family, all its members can switch from one job to another, observing the principle of interchangeability. But in a densely populated community, specialization appears: certain individuals are assigned certain roles.

Ants, like people, are born unequal, explains the scientist. - But the task of the community is to use the potential given to them as efficiently as possible. Those who will guard the approaches to the anthill are identified almost immediately - these comrades from the first days of their lives demonstrate innate aggressiveness and rush into battle without reasoning. The same story with the intellectual elite of the ant family - scouts. Smart ants are able to memorize the sequence of turns on the way to the feeder and transmit information to foragers - food processors. Scouts do not have an innate block of fear, and in case of danger they can hide - nature endowed them with this quality for the sake of the survival of the whole family.

A matter of prestige: your "cockroaches"

Most insects often change their specialization when they are young - they move from shepherds to builders, from builders to nannies, from nannies to sorters. Looking for themselves. Realizing that it is not pulling, the ant switches to another activity. Or they drive him away - in this community, they don't stand on ceremony with losers. If everything goes smoothly, the ant may think it has found its life's work. Those who have not decided on a profession are destined for the role of laborers.

In the process of life, ants can change their profession many times, but no matter how hard they try, beginners cope with their duties worse than their brothers sharpened on this from their youth.

According to scientists, in the ant microcosm there is such a thing as the prestige of the profession. And views on this issue, most likely, do not coincide with human ones. For example, such a story. Among the ants there are warlike types that steal larvae and cocoons from the families of other species with a fight. When the slaves hatch children, they also become slaves and plow for a different kind of family.

Slave owners thus save on the cost of rearing eggs and larvae younger ages. Slaves work well: they quickly carry larvae from place to place in case of danger. It would seem that the family of slave owners live and rejoice. But they pull out the larvae from the slaves and carry them themselves. For them, it's a matter of prestige! Slaves are given the role of builders - a profession respected in our society among ants, apparently, is not quoted.

Main ant professions:

1. Shepherds: they guard green cows - aphids and take sweet drops - excrement (“pad”) from them.
2. Transporters: transfer the honeydew to the nest.
3. Guards: drive the enemy away from the anthill.
4. Hunters: get food for the whole family.
5. Nanny: care for offspring.
6. Foragers: Foraging outside the nest.
7. Builders.

Genetic predisposition plays an important role in choosing a specialty.

drunken orgies

Many other insects (livestock) live in anthills, which ants feed. As a payment, guests (most often aphids) add variety to the ant menu. One of the dwellers, the Lomehuza beetle, with its ether-like secretions, solders the hosts. And the drunken brethren quit their jobs, groom and cherish the beetle that devours their pupae and larvae.

Estimate!

* Even just basking in the sun, ants benefit their community. Having warmed up, they run inside the anthill and cool down there. Thanks to this, on a cool day in an anthill it is 5-10 degrees warmer than on the street.

Only numbers

* Ants settled on the planet earlier than humans by 100 million years.
* 12,000 species of ants live on the planet. The total number of these insects is 15 - 20% of the biomass of the Earth.

Original entry and comments on

And they saw what an anthill looks like. It is a small hill rising above ground level, covered with many twigs, leaves and blades of grass. Small residents of this house are constantly scurrying around next to him. But not many people know how the anthill works from the inside.

Choosing a place for an anthill

The founder of the anthill and all its future inhabitants is the female -. After that, with the male, she flies away from her native home to establish a new colony. In a wooded area, the ant queen chooses secluded places for nests next to trees, in old rotten stumps.

Having found a suitable place, the uterus pulls out a mink and lays the first clutch of eggs there. Having raised her first offspring on her own, the queen is no longer responsible for the further fate of the anthill. Its task is to constantly reproduce, and worker ants take care of it and future generations.

Gradually, the ants build a hill above the ground, which provides heating of the upper levels of the anthill from the sun. Twigs, leaves, sticks, pieces of earth - what ants build an anthill from. By laying the roofing material in a special way, the ants protect the roof of the house from leakage and winds.

On a note!

In the steppes and deserts, the anthill does not have a part that rises above the ground. Strong winds and the scorching sun predetermined the need to build houses deep underground.

The internal structure of the anthill

The anthill from the inside is a set of passages, corridors, chambers and compartments designed for specific purposes. The premises located on the upper levels of the anthill, in summer time heated by the sun and used as a solarium for adult insects.

main building material interior decoration the ant house is a mixture of soil with humus, particles of bark and everything that builder ants bring with them. A large number of moves connecting each other different rooms, provide ventilation in the anthill.

At the middle levels of the ants' dwellings there are rooms with food, pantries with food supplies, compartments for collecting garbage, and there is even an ant cemetery where dead tribesmen are brought. The main entrances to the anthill are also located on the middle level, that is, at the foot of the outer hill.

Interesting!

The lower tiers contain the most valuable compartments, which are very difficult for enemies to reach. In the most secluded place is the so-called "maternity hospital", where the queen lays her eggs. In different chambers of the lower level there is an incubator where the eggs of the uterus are stored, "nurseries" with larvae and pupae. All these compartments are under the constant protection of ants.

A large area is covered by a special chamber designed for. In the lower layers of the soil, they take refuge from frost, providing themselves with everything necessary for the summer period.

Strict hierarchy

In the sectional photo inside, the anthill looks like a labyrinth. But in this labyrinth everything happens according to the algorithm. Each insect has its own duties, which are assigned to it immediately after its birth. An adult can choose a role for herself according to her preferences:

• builder ants;
• nannies;
• workers in the maternity ward;
• transporters;
• warriors;
• guards;
• scouts;
• food getters.

The most responsible and valuable profession among ants is caring for offspring. It is awarded only to ants close to the uterus. Stronger and more aggressive individuals become good warriors and home guards. Insects with orientation skills become scouts for new territories in search of food. Strong and hardy members of the colony carry food and cargo along the countless anthill passages.

The construction of dwellings is carried out by the lowest classes. An anthill is often built by individuals who were enslaved during the next raid on neighboring colonies. During such military campaigns, insects can enter the enemy cell with pupae and steal them. Ants hatched from pupae may even be of a different species, but this does not prevent them from becoming lifelong slaves from birth.

An anthill with ants demonstrates a highly organized form, where each inhabitant contributes to the common cause. Scientists still do not understand what controls all the members of the colony, because they do not have a think tank. But this does not prevent the ants from running their household, raising offspring and arranging life within the walls of a huge house.

The appearance of the anthill Anthill in the context of the life of an anthill

Every nature lover knows how the anthill works, as well as schoolchildren who carefully listen to the teacher. A thorough study of the structure is carried out by scientists - myrmecologists. A single ant seems to be the simplest creature. However, looking at their life inside the anthill, you can see the opposite.

External view of the ant house

From what ants build an anthill, you can see from the outside - dry twigs, sticks, blades of grass, leaves, piles of earth, moss, etc. Construction Materials that are able to convey hardworking insects.

From above, the house looks like a cone-shaped mound with small holes - entrances. This form allows the anthill to warm up well in the sun, not get wet in the rain, and get access to oxygen.

The anthill rises above the grass so that the surrounding vegetation does not block the sun's rays. Over the years, they build it up to several meters in height. Raindrops, falling on a numerous layer of sticks, twigs, leaves, roll down, do not penetrate inside. Open entrances, guarded by a large army of soldiers, serve as ventilation shafts through which air constantly circulates.

Interesting!

Insects start building an anthill from birth. Responsibilities are assigned to workers. The female queen is exclusively engaged in the reproduction of offspring, the upbringing of young animals. An anthill with ants is a whole civilization divided into castes. All residents are biological relatives. Every year the height of the anthill increases.

Scientists have recorded the largest building in the Tomsk region - 3 m in height, 5 m in diameter. The anthill was supposedly built for 20 years.

Internal buildings

An anthill from the inside is much more interesting. It amazes with the well-coordinated work of builders, thoughtfulness, ingenuity and tolerance. Inside, the anthill looks like a collection of passages, exits, all kinds of cameras.

The structure goes underground, is divided into 2 parts, accommodates a whole colony of inhabitants.

1. In the upper tier, insects spend most of their time and live in the warm season. The chambers warm up well, providing ideal conditions for growing offspring.
2. The lower part has similar structures, goes underground by 1-2 meters. There, insects hibernate, wait out cold days, and store food.

Each of these parts is divided into chambers that perform their functions.

1. Queen's room. The uterus lives in it, lays eggs. She is looked after by worker ants who help lay eggs.
2. Egg room. Ants lay eggs here, monitor the provision of proper conditions.
3. room for larvae. The hatched ants are shaped like worms and are particularly gluttonous. They are placed in one chamber in several pieces. Provide food.
4. Food storage. Separately for seeds, grains, aphids, parts of other insects.
5. Garbage warehouse.
6. Tombs for dead ants.
7. A room for wintering, where insects at rest wait out the cold.

The chambers are interconnected by numerous passages, there are several exits, carefully guarded by soldiers. With the approach of danger, the onset of cold weather, the openings of the anthill are closed. A sectional photo of the wonderful structure is shown below.

From birth, there is a division into castes.

1. Most of the family are worker ants. One half provides cosiness, comfort inside the structure, the other brings food from the external environment, builds a house outside.
2. At the head of the hierarchy is the female, who is also called the uterus, the queen. Having fertilized once at a young age, it gives offspring throughout its long life. Finds a place for the future anthill. In 14 days, full-fledged ants appear from the eggs, mainly a working clan. Taken as a building.
3. A small part of society - young males. Their fate is not so happy. After fertilization, the young females die within 2 weeks.

Each ant has its own individual scent. All the inhabitants of a single anthill differ in a specific aroma. By smell, society distinguishes its inhabitant from a stranger. With the help of specific aromas, they report finding food, danger, heterosexual individuals find each other for fertilization. There are more than a dozen "professions" in the ant society:

• scouts;
• warriors-invaders;
• guard soldiers;
• builders;
• orderlies;
• nannies;
• miners;
• shepherds, milkers;
• transporters;
• nurses;
• guardians of food, nectar;
• midwives.

Interesting!

Life in an anthill goes on for years. If there is a threat of collapses, damage, the ant family starts building other housing in the immediate vicinity, in order to more conveniently drag supplies, eggs, and larvae.

The structure of the anthill resembles a big city with a developed civilization, division into societies, and a clear distribution of responsibilities. The simple structure on the outside is the most complex structure on the inside.

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How do ants live

For a long time, scientists knew little about how and how long an ant lives. This allows you to get only general information about how their hierarchy is organized, how many legs an ant has, and so on. Scientists have long made Full description this insect. However, artificial farms and modern facilities for microphotography made it possible to obtain high-quality photos and find out Interesting Facts about the life of these creatures. Such recreated communities allowed scientists to understand whether ants sleep, how their work is organized, where they can be found, what this insect can eat. In other words, the scientific characterization of a given biological species has become much more complete than it was quite recently.

Despite the widespread belief that all varieties of these insects are predators of the microworld, this is not entirely true. In fact, often people do not even know what ants do in winter, they have no idea about the features of their diet. However, this is not all that scientists learned during the analysis. Interesting facts from the life of these insects were found out. Only recently, scientists managed to find out how much an ant of a particular caste weighs.

Organizing an ant colony

For a long time, insects were considered extremely primitive creatures, but this is not so. They create highly developed communities. These insects are extremely small in size, but thanks to the amazing connection between all members of the colony, they work as a single organism. Now there is more data on how ants live. However, their study continues.

As a rule, ants build stationary houses, but there are also nomadic species of insects that build temporary huts from their own bodies by linking their jaws and paws. In such dwellings, the female, ant eggs and larvae, as well as numerous workers, remain for several weeks, and then the whole colony moves on in search of food.

The construction of a stationary anthill begins with the birth of a mature generation. When favorable conditions are created, the queen produces special ant eggs. This generation is then cared for by workers. Sexually mature males and females leave their native anthill to start breeding and build a new colony.

In one season, hundreds of new anthills can be founded. After the female leaves the birth nest, she mates. The resulting material will be enough for her to produce offspring throughout her life. After mating, the female becomes queen. She immediately begins to prepare to take her place in the hierarchy, so she is looking for a small mink or she digs it herself. In it, she lays the first offspring.

All members of the ant community have different life spans. For example, depending on the species, males live from 2 to 14 days. The queen ant is a real long-liver in the world of insects. The average life expectancy of females is 15 to 20 years. A queen who has found a secluded corner immediately lays a significant number of eggs. Asexual members of a new colony usually live 1 to 3 years.

Ant community life

The built small anthill is constantly expanding. Both its aboveground and underground parts are increasing. Construction never stops, so worker ants work all daylight hours. The structure of the anthill is quite complex and includes not only a lot of transitions, but also the following elements:

The larger the colony, the more departments in such a stationary house. Ants hibernate in deep underground passages. The temperature there does not fall below 3-5 °C. Since the ants breed continuously to keep the colony alive, there are several royal chambers in the vast communities. In appearance, any female is a constantly breeding monster. Large anthills need several queens. The number of queens can reach 5-10 individuals to provide a colony with offspring. The development of an ant depends on the characteristics of feeding in the larval form. Reproduction does not stop for a day throughout the warm season.

Ant eggs are unique. Representatives of all castes immediately appear from them, who later build an anthill and perform work for it. normal functioning. Workers create a nest and take care of the new generation. They differ in small sizes. Larger individuals are foragers that participate in the search for food. Another caste is represented by soldiers. Ants attack any creature that poses a danger to the community and are ready to die in the fight against the enemy. It is very difficult to list what ants eat in nature, since these insects are omnivores. The diet of creatures includes:

• any insect;
• juices and pulp of berries;
• seeds;
• carrion;
• some types of plants;
• dew;
• wood resin.

These insects can attack prey of any size. Insects can even cope with the predators of the microworld. The bite of an ant allows you to make a wound for injecting poison.

From early morning to late night foragers roam in search of food. Then the food gets to the uterus, larvae and other members of the colony. These creatures do not need to sleep, but they do not work at night.

Any forager can carry as much as an ant weighs. In some cases, these creatures carry loads that are 5-10 times their own weight. Recently, scientists were able to determine how much an ant weighs after drinking nectar or juice. They attribute the nutrient fluid to other relatives. Therefore, the weight of the ant fluctuates significantly.

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Representatives of some species can winter even in the most severe conditions, where the cold persists 9 months a year. How ants prepare for winter has already been fairly well studied. Insects clog all entrances and move to the lower sections, where the temperature is maintained, which is not detrimental to insects. Ants don't sleep, they just slow down their metabolic processes.

Why do ants live in colonies

New facts about these creatures are emerging even now, despite the fact that ants have been known to mankind since ancient times. Only recently have the ancient ancestors of these unusual creatures been identified. We all know what an ant looks like. The structure of an ant resembles a wasp. This is no coincidence. Not only the study of the anatomy of these insects made it possible to reveal such a relationship. Many fossil early forms have now been discovered that have even more in common with wasps. Photos of these ancient creatures, sealed in amber, confirm their similarity. Ant venom and strong jaws are inherited by modern ants from their ancient ancestors.

Huge bulldog ants have retained the sting they inherited from their distant ancestors. This species is archaic. The bite of an ant is extremely painful. Most species of these insects have lost not only their stingers, but also their wings in order to live on and under the surface of the earth. It was from the ancient wasps that they adopted the principle of hostel life, but over time, their colonies acquired a more complex structure. Insects can communicate with each other. They leave pheromone trails to help them find prey. Such communication is effective and justifies itself. The study of the substances secreted by these insects made it possible to find out how the ants find their way home. Pheromones help to identify strangers and drive them away from the anthill. Insects communicate with each other using rhythmic low-frequency tapping. This allows you to determine whether the encountered individual is a friend or foe. Some species of these insects use abdominal vibration in the process of communication.

The benefits and harms of ants

Insects can live in a variety of ecological zones, so they often conflict with people. Ants spread aphids that feed on the juices of various plants and trees, contributing to their weakening. Ants can damage agricultural plantings, which can lead to the death of the entire crop. But the benefits of ants are also there. Many people do not even suspect what benefits ants bring, but this is very important. These creatures can destroy an incredible number of caterpillars and other insects that harm crop plants in a season. The benefits of ants have been proven. They don't just hurt.

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Anthill - a city in miniature

At first glance, the anthill seems to be a disorderly heap of branches, coniferous needles, grass and earth. However, in fact, a real city lives its own life inside this unsightly heap. Here everyone knows his place, everything is subject to a strict schedule. These tiny insects, not having a highly developed intellect, nevertheless, ants quickly capture any suitable territories and form numerous colonies.

How is an anthill arranged?

Most often there are dome-shaped anthills, but sometimes ants prefer to settle in rotten tree trunks, large old stumps. In regions with extremely hot climates (for example, deserts), insects build their dwellings exclusively underground. The insides of an ordinary anthill consist of large fragments of branches. Between them there are many galleries leading to individual chambers. The height of the structure varies from 30 cm to 2 m, the underground part often exceeds the ground area. The outer covering consists of small twigs, needles, grains of sand and reliably protects ants from dampness, wind and cold.

The internal chambers of the anthill can be divided into the following categories:

• "Solarium" - a small chamber under the very dome of the anthill, insects bask in it in warm time of the year;
• "cemetery" - in this room there are waste and dead individuals;
• "wintering chamber" - located below the soil level, in it the ants survive the cold, plunging into suspended animation;
• "queen's room" - here is the uterus, which is engaged in laying eggs;
• "granary" - designed to store seeds of grasses and trees;
• "nurseries" - chambers in which eggs ripen and ant larvae are born;
• "refrigerator" - they store the corpses of insects, worms and caterpillars.

Each sexually mature insect has a clear idea of ​​the location of the chambers. An increase in the anthill leads to the expansion of existing chambers and the construction of new premises. In places where there are large reserves of resources for ants (water, cereals, insects of other species), dwellings can reach gigantic sizes. In some cases, the colony population may exceed 1.5 million individuals.

Inside the dwelling, a positive temperature is constantly maintained (26-29 degrees Celsius). For this purpose, the needles and branches from the lower layer of the coating are transferred to the surface, ventilated and dried. This process is continuous, about a third of the worker ants are involved in it. Thanks to their efforts, favorable conditions are created for the development of larvae and the preservation of food reserves.

How is an ant colony organized?

Often the social hierarchy within an ant colony is compared to a device bee hive. These two species are similar in many ways, but still the behavior of ants is much more complicated. Just like in human society, these insects have a strict division into classes. Each mature individual has its own purpose.

Depending on a set of certain qualities, each insect is assigned to a particular social post. This takes into account the personal qualities of the individual - excessive aggressiveness, acute sense of smell, reaction speed. In the hierarchy of any anthill there are the following categories of individuals:

• invaders - the most aggressive group in the anthill, attacks neighboring colonies, seizes territories;
• orderlies - isolate sick and wounded ants, if necessary, play the role of surgeons - the injured limb is often amputated (gnawed off);
• builders are one of the largest social groups. They are engaged in the repair of premises, the external coating of the dwelling. Throughout life, they dig new tunnels, carry needles and twigs, maintain the microclimate inside the anthill;
• nannies - take care of the offspring, from the appearance of an egg to the maturation of an individual. They are constantly near the larvae, turn over, control the process of hatching from eggs and feed the growing offspring;
• guards - they protect the entrances and exits of the anthill, in case of an attack they attack the enemy and prevent him from getting inside the dwelling. Among this category there are the most losses, attacks on neighbors are a common thing for neighboring colonies. In addition, birds and some animals love to eat ants, and the guards never leave their posts, protecting the entrance to the last.
• foragers. The largest group in the colony. Their mission is to get food for the entire anthill. Every day, miners go in search of food - grass seeds, dead and weakened insects, fruits and berries. If one ant finds a large insect (caterpillar, beetle), then with the help of special signals it communicates with fellow tribesmen, “telling” about the prey. Together, insects can drag even a dead rodent. Often there are attacks on weakened or injured bees, worms, mice. From numerous bites, the victim dies and becomes food for the colony;
• shepherds. Another amazing feature of these insects is that they have peculiar pets. Grass aphids feed on plants, and the liquid released in the process - honeydew - is collected by ants. This liquid is a waste product of aphids, has a sweetish taste and is a kind of delicacy for insects. The carbohydrates contained in the honeydew provide the ants with energy. Therefore, aphids are collected in a kind of “herds” and protected in every possible way (for example, from theft by ants from neighboring colonies). To increase the amount of honeydew, shepherds tickle the belly of their cows, stimulating the production of a valuable substance;
• carriers - work together with shepherds, their main task is to carry honeydew to special chambers. If necessary, they engage in battle with the invaders;
• storekeepers - responsible for maintaining stocks inside the cells. Monitor maintenance temperature regime and stock safety. It is on them that the life of the colony in the winter months depends, since the competent conservation of food resources ensures the prosperity of the anthill;

Depending on the habitat, special “professions” appear. For example, leaf-cutting ants that live in forests collect the leaves of certain trees and plants. After they are transferred to the anthill, twisted in a special way and used to grow mushrooms, which are one of the main products in their diet.

Ant life in an anthill

Every ant colony, regardless of species, has one or more queens. This is a large sexually mature individual, a characteristic difference is large transparent wings. They are necessary to search for males, immediately after successful fertilization, the need for them disappears and they disappear. The life span of the queen is 3 to 6 years, almost twice as long as the average worker. There are cases when the queen lived up to 13 years, while insects live longer in regions with a temperate climate. Male drones live the least, their life span is not more than a month. After fertilization of the uterus, they are killed as unnecessary.

The fertilized queen lays her eggs in the deepest and most extensive chamber of the anthill, deep underground. This is necessary to protect offspring from predators, temperature changes and other dangerous factors. The way of life of the queen for each species is different. So, wild forest ants have several hundred young unfertilized females in the colony. After mating, females lay eggs throughout the forest, next to them new colonies form.

Ants living next to humans always have several dozen male drones in the colony. The vast majority of the population consists of underdeveloped females. In a small colony, there is only one queen uterus, carrying out the continuation of the family. If the conditions in the house or apartment are favorable (warmth, dampness, unsanitary conditions), then the number of ants increases rapidly. In this case, there are several new queens capable of reproduction. These females do not form new colonies, but remain part of the existing one. Of course, with an increase in the number of queens, the spread of ants around the house accelerates.

Ant Relationships

Among these small insects there is also a peculiar struggle for power. For example, in colonies of red ants, cases of colonies of another species were observed. The queen uterus finds a colony of black or forest relatives weakened as a result of the attack and takes the place of the dead queen. After she lays eggs, and when red ants hatch from them, they actually enslave a colony of another species.

The reverse situation also takes place. During the attack of one anthill on another, soldiers steal the eggs of opponents and take them to themselves. After the hatched insects become servants and work all their lives for the benefit of a foreign colony. The life of many varieties of tropical ants is built on this principle: for example, Amazon ants are exclusively engaged in attacks on neighbors and capturing larvae, work inside their dwellings and life support occur exclusively at the expense of slaves.

The anthill is not the best neighborhood

Of course, forest ants bring invaluable benefits - the destruction of carrion, maintaining the population of birds and small animals. It is categorically impossible to ruin the housing of forest orderlies, but it is unacceptable to endure neighborhood in your own house or apartment. That is why, at the first sign of the appearance of these insects in the house, measures must be taken - getting rid of trash, using folk methods fight. If the moment is lost and the colony has reached an impressive size, optimal solution there will be an appeal to experts.

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How ants fight for their anthill

The ant colony fights off an air attack. Ants shoot acid into the air, scaring away predators such as woodpeckers and jays. According to the author of the pictures, the acid does not cause burning when it comes into contact with the skin of the hands, but it has a strong smell, reminiscent of the smell of fried potatoes with fish.

Let's take a closer look at them...

Well, let's learn more about the life of ants.

Ants are a secret society, one of a million scattered across the globe. For millions of years they have been exchanging encrypted information and laying secret paths. Only now are we beginning to recognize them, only getting close to their secret codes.

In some ways, ants are like aliens. They can carry loads up to 100 times their weight. They can hang upside down on smooth glass. They consume huge amounts of food and travel very long distances. Each ant has considerable power, and acting together they turn into a super-civilization.

Forest ants pave roads in search of food. Each colony of this species has hundreds of thousands of individuals. And like any community, it must be constantly supplied with food. But how do ants find food and how do they deliver it to the anthill? At first glance, their activity may seem chaotic, but in fact it is not. The ants somehow coordinate efforts, which allows them to attack larger insects, kill them and drag them to the anthill. The work of ants is organized very efficiently. Such a colony eats about 10 million insects per year.

The anthill is one of the most amazing structures. What is the secret of ants and what allows them to be the most formidable predators on Earth, consuming more food than lions, tigers and wolves combined?

Forest ants do not care who destroys their anthill - a predator or a scientist ... they react the same way. Worker ants shoot formic acid into the air. The life of an individual does not matter. The survival of the entire colony is important. Ants behave like a single superorganism that is able to withstand the attack of any predator, even a bear. About 10 thousand larvae and pupae are hidden in the depths of the anthill, they are the future of this superorganism. To get to them, the bear needs to overcome a thick cloud of acid fumes. Ants are ready to protect their offspring at the cost of their own lives. The acid burns the bear's eyes and nose. The predator usually retreats, preferring to find prey easier.

Food of animal origin is necessary for larvae, while adult ants feed on honeydew, which is secreted by forest aphids. It contains a lot of sugar and vitamins. Ants protect and take care of aphids as pets. The volume of consumed nectar is very significant. The average colony of forest ants eats 100 kg of honeydew per year.

In the jungles of Indonesia, such partnerships between ants and insects of other species are even more developed. Ants go to powerful inflorescences, where their wards - honey beetles graze. These tropical ants, like their forest relatives, feed on the sweet secretion secreted by other insects. Like shepherds who move their flocks to new pastures, ants carry their wards from flower to flower, where there is more nectar. These insects are typical shepherds - nomads. Together with their domesticated beetles, they migrate from one plant to another. Only humans and ants have pets.

To wait out the approaching thunderstorm, ants drive their beetles under large leaves. How ants sense the approach of rain is a mystery, but their forecast is always accurate. Such a relationship is beneficial to both parties: the beetles receive a transfer to the most best flowers and ants have an almost unlimited supply of food. Ants are more adept at building these kinds of relationships.

To find out how well ants stick to slippery surfaces, scientists conducted an original experiment. Ants - tailors were put in a centrifuge, a miniature copy of the one in which cosmonauts are trained. Even with a hundredfold overload, the ants stay on the surface of smooth glass. A person would not have survived such a test. The secret lies in the thinnest sticky film covering their paws. Ants-tailors use their tenacity in the construction of dwellings. With their jaws, they draw the leaves close to each other and hold them in this position until the workers glue the linked leaves together.

Where did these amazing insects come from? Ants evolved from wasps over 100 million years ago. Some species have preserved individual features that make them related to their ancestors. For example, Australian ants - bulldogs have a wasp sting. In this species, unlike others, worker ants are not inferior to the queen in size and even retain the ability to lay eggs. True, their eggs go to feed the larvae, because only the queen is entrusted with the right to produce a new generation. Bulldog ants differ not only in this. Their community is organized somewhat differently. They have no division into castes. When the queen mother dies, several female worker ants, capable of fertilization, claim her place. The winner is determined at the jousting tournament. Ants stand in front of each other and menacingly drive from side to side with their jaws and antennae. But fights, even ritual ones, are rare in the ant world. Usually insects work peacefully side by side for the benefit of their ant state.

Science knows several thousand species of ants. This is a very successful developing group of insects, which owes its prosperity not to the strength of individual individuals, but to the clear and balanced organization of the entire community.

Ants are an extremely diverse family of insects, but they all have one thing in common. common feature- they live in communities in which a developed system of social relations. Ants are not found alone in nature. In the course of evolution, it turned out that only 3-5% of the species of living beings lead a social lifestyle. Among them is the species to which we belong - Homo Sapiens. It is worth noting that these species play a dominant role in any ecosystem.

Leaf-cutting ants have created the most perfect type of ant state. The activity of the colony is comparable to the well-coordinated movements of a huge hand extended to food. The process of gathering food is so well organized among ants that even Argentine shepherds have to reckon with them. Ants - leaf cutters live in huge underground cities. Ants scare shepherds not by their numbers, but by their organization. They are so efficient in preparing feed that they are a real competitor to domestic animals.

How do they do it?

The answer lies in three concepts: specialization, cooperation and communication. The first specialists of a narrow profile are, directly, leaf cutters. They have powerful jaws, large heads and developed muscles. Their task is to gnaw through the stalks of grass. If the stem is too thick, the ants act in a brigade manner. Sheet cutters make blanks of a certain length, convenient for transportation.

Then the porters take over. They are smaller and more elegant than their relatives. porters drag the cut grass up to 50 meters and stack it. Another team carries them further, to the anthill. Ants lay real clearings up to 300 meters long, diverging in different directions from the underground city. Each underground anthill harvests about half a ton of grass per year.

The organization of ants is striking. The coordination of their actions is especially noticeable during a situation that is dangerous for the colony. With the destruction of the dwelling of ants, the main thing for them is the survival of future generations - larvae and pupae. Once the larvae are safe, the ants start looking for a new home. Scout ants scatter in all directions, leaving a scent trail behind them. An ant that finds a suitable place marks it. Other scouts follow this trail. They also mark the places they like. As a result, the site for a new home is determined by biochemical democracy. Nobody orders anyone. The desired point is selected collectively, based on the intensity of odors. The larvae-pupae are transferred to a new dwelling along an invisible path, marked only by a smell. So a new location was selected using a chemical communication system. This scheme is simple and effective. Ants don't need bosses. These hard workers themselves are able to find the best place for life. Chemical communication is the key to understanding the success of these enigmatic insects.

In most ant species, the queen is the head of the colony. She reports the onset of the fertilization period with a specific smell. The sex of the offspring is regulated in a special way. From fertilized eggs, females are born - these are future queens and worker ants. Males appear from unfertilized ones, whose role is reduced only to mating. The life of a male is very short, but he can become a father even 20 years after his death. Sperm is stored in the uterus in a specially designated place long years. We can say that ants invented the sperm bank millions of years ago. In the body of the uterus, the sperm remains viable from 10 to 20 years, and in some cases even longer.

The smell of a huge queen pervades the entire underground city. It is the smell that informs the ants about the state of the queen, and while she is healthy, the working individuals remain barren and do not lay eggs. Chemical signals govern the life of the colony, they also give the command to swarm, i.e. to the emergence of sexually mature individuals. Scientists have not yet learned how to predict this moment.

In winter, leaf cutters climb trees in search of food and quickly get used to new conditions. Large working individuals gnaw off leaves entirely. Leaves are dropped to the ground. It would not be rational to drag them down. Downstairs, another team takes over. Large leaves are gnawed into pieces that are convenient for transportation. Porters use a chemical alarm system. The more food, the large quantity porters drag it, the stronger the odorous trace they leave. By smell, new porters rush to the rescue. The community organizes itself. But odorous substances are not the only way to transmit information.

Scientists have found that leaf cutters still have the opportunity to inform relatives about the location of food. The ant, it turns out, “sings” a high-frequency song with its belly. Vibration through the head is transmitted to the plant. Ants sing this song when they find delicacies. Other leaf cutters with their legs feel the vibration at a distance of up to a meter - in this way additional forces are convened to harvest especially high-quality leaves.

Is there a force in the world that can destroy the work of this well-established system? Unfortunately, there is such power. Usually the old grass is burned to prepare the land for the next season. Zala fertilizes the soil and increases pasture productivity. Ants do not know what fire is, they do not know how to resist it and do not flee. They continue to do their job like robots until they burn to death. Fire devours grass and destroys ant trails. Everything turns to dust. Chaos reigns. Deprived of scent indicators, the ants scatter in different directions. But the ant state does not give up. porters pave new trails, leaving scent marks behind. The chemical commands that regulate life are the secret to the organization of ants.

Ants are great specialists in the field of information transfer. Their whole life is built on this. Without this, such an amazing coordination of their actions would not have been possible. It is thanks to ants that we have made a number of discoveries, for example, in the field of chemical bonding.

Ants seem to be mysterious and incomprehensible creatures because we do not understand their language of communication, which is based on smell, not visual perception. Ants are attracted not only by their own smell. For example, wood ants cannot resist the smell of resin. Sometimes, while collecting resin, insects fall into a trap. History repeats itself over and over again for millions of years. It is thanks to this that we have learned a lot about the evolution of ants. Resin, eventually turning into amber, seems to preserve insects. Why do ants fall into this trap? In fact, they need dried resin and they spend a lot of effort to collect it and drag it into the anthill. Having taken on a load 10 times their own weight, they run a marathon distance with it. They are not even embarrassed by the inconvenient shape of the frozen pieces of resin. Why do they spend so much energy?

They distribute the resin throughout the anthill. Resin is medicine. It contains a substance that destroys fungus and bacteria. Every time the ant runs through the resin, it disinfects itself, in this way the forest ants provide a healthy atmosphere inside the anthill.

Leaf cutter ants also have to contend with various bacteria. They themselves feed on the fungus they grow. Grass and leaves inside the anthill turn into compost, in which the desired fungus develops. To protect their underground plantations from harmful bacteria, ants treat all the mass they bring to the nest with an antibiotic that they themselves produce. The life of the entire colony depends on the safety of the entire plantation. Some ants never leave the underground city at all. These individuals are much smaller than the others in size. They are engaged in weeding the beds and caring for the growing offspring. Underground plantations must be constantly ventilated: for the growth of the fungus, certain temperature and humidity.

The air conditioning system allows you to maintain the optimal temperature, humidity and gas concentration in the depths of the anthill. When the compost rots, a large amount of carbon dioxide is formed, together with warm air, this gas escapes through the ventilation shafts. How do these tiny creatures manage to create their own microclimate? How does this superorganism manage to build this underground city-state. The ventilation system of the anthill is very complex and to understand it you need to get inside the anthill. Scientists have also discovered special garbage pits where waste products and waste material from fungal plantations are dumped. Pits are needed not only to maintain the frequency. Decay of waste and fresh compost occurs at different temperatures, which leads to the formation of different air flows. Air saturated with carbon dioxide is pushed up and pumped in from the outside Fresh air.

The next stage of the study is to show what the underground city looks like inside. To do this, cement is poured into the anthill. The amount of cement required amazed scientists ... 10 tons of mortar went underground in 3 days. Excavations began a month later. It took more than one week to figure out the structure of the underground city. With the help of a bulldozer, scientists dug up tons of earth and, finally, the ant city opened up before them.

The main areas of the underground city are interconnected by tunnels - freeways, in addition to them, there is a whole system of highways and paths that go to every fungal plantation and every garbage pit.

Tunnels provide good ventilation and are the shortest communication routes.

It looks like it was all built according to a single plan of a brilliant architect, but of course it is not. A huge, most complex city in structure was created by the collective will of all the inhabitants of the colony - an ant superorganism. Anthill takes 50 square meters and goes underground for 8 meters.

During its construction, the ants had to dig up 40 tons of earth. Billions of times, porters have dragged on themselves a load that is four times the weight of each of them. By human standards, this weight was dragged up the narrow tunnel for almost a kilometer. The construction of such a structure is comparable to the construction of a great Chinese wall and it can be called without exaggeration one of the wonders of the world.

Ants never cease to amaze us. Ant - the tailor can move upside down on smooth glass. It can withstand hurricane-force winds. Any ant can easily outdo any world champion in weightlifting. Holding on a smooth surface upside down, the ant holds a weight 100 times its own. These tiny creatures are amazing. Not a single vertebrate creature, including humans, is capable of such a test. But what makes ants truly invincible is their ability to work together. Some of them plant gardens and kitchen gardens, entering into alliances with plants and fungi, others - pastoralists graze aphids and honey beetles.

The secret power of ants lies in their cooperation, which is based on an invisible odor system of relationships. This organizing principle is capable of uniting millions of individuals, which will act as a single superorganism. The priority of public interests over the needs of everyone turns these tiny insects into a real super-community, into a secret force of nature.

Ants are such numerous insects on our planet that there are several thousand of their species. A single ant does not seem to be a complex and dangerous creature with intelligence. But this impression is deceptive, since ants do not live alone, but in a group and in the system of interaction of these insects one can be amazed at their high organization and clear division of responsibilities. In fact, ants can be compared with people, only we can still learn from their tolerance, diligence and coherence in work. “Plows like an ant,” we say about a hardworking person, imagining a small insect that drags an object several times its weight and size.

These insects live in large families that persist for several years; in fact, all ants in such a colony are relatives with biological point from a social point of view, it is a city whose population is strictly divided into castes and strictly organized. In fact, we can say that a parallel civilization is seething and developing under our feet.

We interact through speech, gestures and facial expressions, and ants communicate through the exchange of food and through smells, each ant has its own unique smell, and each family has its own unique shades of smells, thanks to which insects feel that a stranger has entered their home. Also, their interaction is carried out with the help of pheromones, using which insects inform each other about the location of food or danger.

We know from school how the anthill works and how complicated everything is in it, but myrmecologists are engaged in more serious studies of the ant society.

Anthill device

The anthill looks like an ordinary mountain of branches, blades of grass, pieces of earth, but in fact it is a subtly and well-thought-out dwelling, inside of which everything is much more interesting than outside.

The ant house has the shape of a cone for a reason, thanks to it the rain rolls down the blades of grass and needles almost without getting inside. The anthill rises above the level of the grass, so that the sun's rays penetrate inside, with which the ants warm up, and also warm their larvae and pupae. And the deeper layers of the anthill is a refuge for insects on cold days. Thanks to a cunning project, ants spend summer in a summer cone, and winter in earthen passages.

Parts of an ant dwelling

Looking at the picture, you can see the various parts of the anthill, the following describes what each of them serves for:

1. The top cover, consisting of needles, blades of grass and twigs, protects the ant house from the weather.
2. A chamber heated by the sun's rays - here the ants warm themselves and their offspring.
3. One of the many entrances, guarded by soldiers, in addition to being a door, also serves as a channel for ventilation.
4. Warehouse for garbage and dead ants.
5. A wintering chamber where ants sleepily wait out the cold.
6. Storage room for grains.
7. The queen's chamber, where the queen lives and lays her eggs, which is cared for by worker ants.
8. Chamber for eggs and larvae.
9. Aphid chamber.
10. Pantry for caterpillars and other "meat" prey.

It is interesting! The largest anthill in the world is located in the Tomsk region near the village of Zavarzino. This conclusion was made by Tomsk local historians, who measured this structure. In order to build such an ant house, the ant family, according to scientists, took at least 20 years. The record parameters are 3 meters high and 5 meters in diameter. According to local historians, this anthill is overgrown, but its inhabitants have already started building a new dwelling nearby. It is possible that it will not be inferior in size to the old one.

How is an ant colony organized? Ant life in an anthill

In order to figure out how ants live in an anthill, let's start from birth. Once a year, males and females hatch from eggs, which are ready for procreation, they have wings and scatter in different directions for mating. Males, after fulfilling their main purpose - fertilization, die, and females fly away in search of a place for a new colony. Having found it, the female gnaws off her wings in order to obtain additional nutrients and begins to actively lay eggs.

At first, hungry times await her, she survives only due to the accumulated fat layer, but then, when the first representatives of the offspring hatch, they begin to provide her and the larvae with everything necessary. The ant queen mother mates only once, while her sperm reserve is enough for her entire long (up to 20 years) life to recreate offspring.

These insects are Hymenoptera, males develop from unfertilized eggs and have a single set of chromosomes, and females are endowed with a double set. In this state of affairs, daughters acquire the entire genome from their father, and half from their mother. At the same time, sisters become closer relatives to each other than daughters are to their mother. Despite the fact that the word "ant" is masculine, all female worker ants are the daughters of the queen queen, who cannot mate and remain unfertilized all their lives.

Ants and their larvae

Ant social strata

Ants, like humans, have social relationships and hierarchies. Everyone has a set of qualities: intelligence, aggressiveness, reaction speed, enterprise, ability to communicate with others. Depending on what qualities dominate in each, the ant receives a certain profession:

• invader warriors - the main task is to capture new territories and attack other anthills in order to steal larvae and cocoons in order to later turn them into slaves working for the benefit of someone else's anthill;
• builders - diligently maintain the structure and condition of the anthill, create new tunnels and communications as the number of residents grows, every day hundreds of builder ants drag needles and twigs from above into the deep layers of the anthill, and from the lower floors to the top. Thus, a stable humidity regime is maintained and that is why the dome of the anthill does not rot and does not grow moldy;
• orderlies - isolate sick ants from society, if the patient's limb is damaged, they amputate it, biting it off with their powerful jaws;
• nannies-nurses - take care of the offspring and are engaged in education;
• getters - get and store food;
• guards - protect the entrances to the anthill from strangers and ensure the safety of the queen with the larvae;
• shepherds or milkers - ants have their own pets. Aphids eat vegetation and secrete droplets of a sweet liquid called honeydew. Mutually beneficial cooperation has been established between insects. Ants tickle aphids and get honeydew - for them this is a delicious and nutritious food, which is the main source of carbohydrates. And in the form of a reciprocal service, they graze and protect their dairy cows from the attack of predators;
• transporters - transfer the pad to the anthill;
• workers of the maternity hospital - carry eggs in specially designated compartments and are responsible for maintaining the required temperature regime;
• nectar keepers - necessary in the anthill in case there are suddenly hungry times in it, and the ants-producers will not be able to find food. Then the products that thrifty keepers always have come in handy;
• scouts - looking for new places where you can get food.

Depending on how many ants are in the anthill, there is a division of labor. In a small ant family, all its members can engage in different activities, observing the principle of interchangeability. But in a large community, specializations appear and individual ants are assigned their own roles.

Ants, just like people, are not born equal, with different genetic predispositions, and the main task of the community is the effective use of the potential of each family member. So, for example, those who become guards and warriors initially show an aggressive disposition and, without reasoning, rush into battle, they are slightly larger than the rest of their relatives and have strong tentacles. The same story with the intellectual elite of the ant community - scouts. Smart ants have the ability to remember the sequence of turns on their way to a new food site and relay this information to the foragers.

The question of the prestige of the profession

At a young age, ants can change their profession and look for themselves in different types activities, for those who are not determined with specialization, the role of laborers is prepared. No matter how hard they try, newcomers cope with their duties worse than older and more experienced fellow tribesmen. According to scientists in the world of ants there is such a thing as the prestige of the profession. For example, the lower caste - slaves, ants do not allow the larvae to be dragged and even in case of danger they take them away and carry them themselves. For them, it's a matter of prestige! Slaves are assigned the role of builders, apparently, this profession is not quoted among ants.

Self-affirmation: “suitcase pose”

In order to secure their place under the sun, insects are forced to show their tough temper. They sometimes behave aggressively towards their fellow tribesmen: they run into each other, rise above the enemy, defiantly walk on high and tense legs, bite painfully. The winner in a dispute can grab the loser and force him to crouch in a “suitcase position”, then drag him off the battlefield, can carry him to the anthill and throw him there so that he does not interfere with his career and no longer approaches the winner.

It is amazing that ants live so harmoniously and work as a single mechanism for the benefit of their family, while not having one “think tank”. Moreover, the anatomical features of one ant will not allow it to be the sole manager - the capabilities of its nervous system are too small for such a large amount of programs and information that are necessary to control the life of an entire anthill.

The life of ants in an anthill is unique, very interesting and requires a long study to comprehend the new secrets of these tiny but strong insects.