What are these ants doing?
While taking pictures last week, I came across several ants traveling along the stem of a bush. I tried to get a good shot of one crawling along the thin limbs, but I just couldn’t get a good shot. After some time, I became curious about what they were doing. When I took a closer look, I was even more puzzled.
I have some suspicions about what was going on, but the truth is I don’t really know. There were several of these “bumps” on the bush and the ants were traveling from one to the other. There were perhaps five ants in total that I saw.
You can see in the picture that some fluid appears to be coming out of the mound. My suspicion is that the ants are lapping this up and it is some sort of sugary compound that the ants like. I have read about situations where a plant entices ants to live on it for the sake of self defense. The plant provides a place to live and nourishment for hte ants, and in exchange the ants chase away insects that feed on the plant.
I’m not sure if that is what is happening in this case, but that is my best guess.
My second guess is that these “bumps” are not actually part of the plant. They don’t exactly look like they are attached to the plant and perhaps they are some insect themselves. I have read about ants tending to aphids – kind of like how humans tend to cows. However, as far as I know aphids give birth to smaller versions of themselves. The photo above certainly does not look like an aphid, but as far as I know these are not limited to aphids alone.
I spent some time trying to identify this ant, but I have to say that I truly have no idea. I have a copy of Ants of North America, but the only thing it told me was this is from the subfamily Formica, which didn’t help me too much.
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Tags: ant, identification, mystery
I believe those insects the ants are feeding on are called scale insects.