Ant Hill Wood

The most recent addition to my own ant collection is a nice, healthy colony of T. impurum. These tiny black ants are yet another monogyn species, very similar in size, shape and habit to T. caespitum; except that, unlike the latter, T. impurum is not a native to Britain. It is however, fairly common to many areas of Europe.

In both pictures, you can see the large queen with workers and brood. The colony arrived on Friday the 2nd of June, 2006, with about 60-70 workers and an assortment of larvae & pupae.

Here we see young queen ants which are just about to go off on their nuptial mating flight. The females in the picture are Lasius niger, and once mated, they shed their wings very quickly after returning to the ground, as when the young queens are fully fertilized by the male ants (which are also winged ) they will never fly again and spend the rest of their life living deep inside their underground nests.

 On both of these photos, you will see that excited worker ants often accompany the young winged queens, almost as though they have come out to wish them goodbye, or could it be "good ridance"? Either way, worker ants always pour out from the nest when the mating flights are due to take place.

My wife was out in our garden, and decided to take a quick peek at the large Lasius niger colony we have living under the paving stones. I wondered what all the excitement was when she dashed in, grabbed her camera; then swiftly dashed out again.

About 7 minutes later, Jenny returned with a beaming smile on her face saying, " I've been bitten all up my arms, had worker ants in my hair and down my shirt top; but just look at what I found " !! So here are the photos of the Lasius niger, complete with cocooned pupae. The larger, darker brown cocoons are ones from which young princesses will emerge ( sexual winged females ) and these are destined to become new queens once they have mated.

Once more, I have my wife to thank for always having her camera on her; as she took these lovely shots of a Lasius niger worker tending her herd of aphids, which ants use and milk much the same way as we do our cows.

The worker here is gently protecting her herd of cattle ( aphids ) and will stroke the rear of the aphids with her antennae. The result of this is, the aphid exudes a sweet liquid called " Honeydew " which the ants eagerly lick up and take back to their nests, stored in their crop. It is then regurgitated and passed onto other ants in the colony by the act of trophallaxis ( the exchange of food in liquid form via mouth to mouth ).

A young member of my Ant Hill World forum took these amazing photos of L. niger workers digging their tunnels. The young man's name is Tom, and he lives in Somerset, England.

The close up detail of such a small ant species as Lasius niger is fantastic, and Tom has done a brilliant job at capturing these fast moving little black ants on camera.  I would like to say thank you to him for giving his kind permission to let me show these great pictures on my web site !

Note the way the worker ants carry small stones in their mandibles as they excavate the soil.

Here is a lovely shot of a worker carrying a small pebble in her jaws.

An interesting ant belonging to the Myrmicine family of ants, which sting much the same as Myrmica red ants do. This species is a monogynous one, with only 1 queen per nest; but as she is very prolific, these ants can form very large colonies. They eats lots of seeds as well as insects, and can be seen on open heathland. The New Forest in Hampshire, England is reputed to abound with them on the open sandy land amongst the heather ! In fact, this part of the UK probably has the largest numbers of ant species.

Known as " Pavement Ants " in the USA, where they are very commonly found, this species also inhabits many parts of Europe; but is only found mainly in the south of England, rarely further north than the M4 motorway !

I would like to thank my very good friend Antti, who lives in Finland, for allowing me to use his photo which he took of his own colony. The photo shows a close up of queen with workers and brood.

More foraging workers found on,and under,pieces of stone in the hills of East Cheshire.The clumps of white on the bottom are actually spiders nests full of eggs,and have no food value to the ants.The hunting ants are evidently looking for larger,more tasty morsels than spider eggs and would probably prefer to eat the spider which laid them !!

 The hills of Cheshire have lots of Formica lemani nests,usually found under bits of local limestone from the quarries.Springtime is ideal to find their queens if the weather is warm and sunny.Too cold and they retreat underground,the same also applies with the heat of summer.

Here are Formica and Myrmica living under the same stone.Strangely,these 2 species of ants seemed to be living in harmony with each other,which is extremely surprising,as unrelated ants are normally very hostile to members of opposing "tribes".

 Large packs of hunting worker ants often come into contact with foragers from other nests. Here,a number of Formica ants are checking each other out with their antennae. If an alien ant had been detected in this group,it would have been immediately attacked. The fact that these workers made no aggressive moves towards each other,strongly suggests they are all sisters from the same nest.

A really lovely picture,this one of Formica fusca workers grouping around a cluster of eggs. The worker/nurse ants lick the eggs to clean off particles of dirt and any fungi spores that may infect the eggs. They also move eggs around the nest, finding the right temperature and humidity for them to hatch into larvae. My thanks go to Tuttle, my French friend, who also runs a web site on ants in France.

Here we can see a newly eclosed young worker ant, also called a "callow" of Formica fusca. Its colour is very pale and ghostly; but as she matures in a week or so, she will take on the dull coal black colouration of her sisters !

 This wonderful photo was taken by my good friend Tuttle.

This photo taken by my good friend Tuttle, a brilliant French photographer of ants, is of his colony of C. vagus ants with larvae and pupae. These ants are very large compared to most British species, and have minor and major workers. Thanks to Tuttle for allowing me to use some of his super pics to illustrate the life of nurse ants when caring for their brood !

Again, this great photo is one of Tuttle's, showing a nice shot of a Camponotus vagus major worker. The majors are very big,strong ants who act as guards in defence of the colony; and will also protect the smaller minor workers when they leave the nest to go on foraging expeditions. With one bite, a major worker is quite capable of decapitating a prey food item, or even chopping of heads or limbs from enemy ants. They are truly a " major asset " to have around !