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Neat to know ~ Creature of the week

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A Tiny Hercules: The Leafcutter Ant

Photo: Scott Bauer, US Dept. of Agriculture, CC BY 2.5

The Leafcutter Ant

2020-09-01

– “Leafcutter” is a general term that includes over 40 different species of ant.

– Most species of leafcutter ant live in South and Central America.  Some are also found in the southern regions of North America.

– These ants thrive in wooded areas, particularly tropical forests.

– Leafcutter ants are remarkably strong.  They can carry loads many times their size.

– Despite being regarded as pests by humans, leaf-cutter ants play a critical role in maintaining the health of their ecosystems.

Read on to learn more about the extraordinary leafcutter ant.

Outrageous strength!

  • Leafcutter ants are able to carry weights that are 20 to 50 times heavier than they are.  Try to calculate 20 to 50 times your weight.  That’s how much you would be able to carry, if you were a leafcutter ant.  A 150-lb. (68-kg) human with the relative strength of a leafcutter ant would be able to carry 1-2 cars!
  • These ants carry their leafy cargo in their powerful jaws, which slice through leaves quickly and efficiently, using a rapid sawing motion.
  • Rather than being admired for their strength, leafcutter ants are considered serious pests – especially by farmers.  This is not surprising, considering that these tiny powerhouses can strip a tree of its foliage within 24 hours!

What do they do with all those leaves?

  • Contrary to what you might think, leafcutter ants do not actually eat the leaf fragments they bring back to their nests. Instead, they use the clippings to cultivate a special fungus, which grows as the leaves decompose.
  • Ant larvae feed on this fungus, which is unique to leafcutter ant nests.  The adults feed on leaf sap.

No jobless ants.

  • A leafcutter ant colony can have a population of up to 10 million!  To see their scurrying masses in nature, one might wonder who is in charge and how anything gets done.  But an ant colony is the very definition of organized chaos.  Each of those millions of ants has a distinct mission to carry out.  
  • Leafcutter ant societies are highly structured and super organized.  

– Even in a colony of millions, there is only one queen.  She has the critical role of “mother” to the other ants in the nest; in fact, she alone has the ability to reproduce.  Over the span of her life, she produces 100-200 million young.

– The largest ants in a colony are called Majors.  Their jobs include defending the colony as well as taking on the work that requires the most strength, like clearing paths for other members of the colony to use as they gather leaves.

– The Mediae are the ants who do most of the leaf-cutting and transporting.

– The Minors stand by and protect the leaf-transportation pathways.  They also keep an eye on the food source, protecting it from intruders.

– The Minims are the smallest members of the colony.  They stay in the nest and act as housekeepers, farmers and babysitters.  The cultivation of the fungus as well as the care of the larvae are among their most important jobs.  Some of them also work as trash collectors.  These ants remove any rotting material from the fungus garden and place it in special spaces in the under-reaches of the nest, reserved exclusively for trash storage.  Interestingly, once an ant starts working as a trash collector, it never comes in contact with either the fungus or the queen, so as to prevent contamination.

  • The efficient movement of millions of ants requires a high level of teamwork and coordination.  Each ant is busy, making its way to the food source, cutting leaves, or transporting leaf fragments back to the nest.   Lines of leafcutter ants moving back and forth between their nest and food sources can be up to 30 meters long.

Lessons from the Leafcutters

  • The tireless work of each leafcutter ant is of course crucial to the survival of its colony.  But actually, these creatures can teach us humans about surviving and thriving, while at the same time helping the environment, rather than destroying it.  While cutting leaves from a plant may seem like a destructive act, in fact, this helps plants grow, similar to the way pruning a shrub helps that shrub grow back stronger and healthier.
  • By cutting back leaves, these ants promote the growth of new shoots.  And, thanks to leafcutter ants breaking down plant matter, the soil receives nutrients, making it richer and more fertile.

Sources: Salvo, Michael, elegantetymology.weebly.com“Leafcutter Ant,”  https://elegantentomology.weebly.com/leaf-cutter-ants.html#:~:text=Leafcutter%20ants%2C&text=Acromyrmex%20and%20Atta%20exhibit%20a,known%20as%20soldiers%20or%20dinergates; Marwell Zoo, marwell.org.uk, “Leaf-cutter Ants (Atta cephalotes),”https://www.marwell.org.uk/zoo/explore/animals/18/leaf-cutter-ants; McVean, Ada, mcgill.ca“Leafcutter Ants are Farmers Who Grow Fungi,” https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/did-you-know/did-you-know-leafcutter-ants-are-farmers-who-grow-fungi; onekindplanet.org, “Leaf Cutter Ant,” https://onekindplanet.org/animal/leaf-cutter-ant/#:~:text=There%20are%20about%2040%20species,up%20to%2030%20meters’%20long!; Heimbuch, Jaymi, treehugger.com, “5 Crazy Facts About Leaf-cutter Ants,” https://www.treehugger.com/crazy-facts-leaf-cutter-ants-4864484, May 7, 2020.