Ant tunneling

[Lucas Allen]

We loved the Ants Exhibit at the Field Museum! 

On the way home, we were wondering how ant colonies "know" where to dig their intricate tunneling system.  Are the pathways random or planned? 

Also, if left alone, will the ants just keep digging until the subterrain is essentially a single large hole, or do the ants "engineer" their tunnels so that it does not collapse upon itself?

This is fascinating stuff!


Lucas

[Corrie Moreau]

Lucas,

Great questions! I am glad you enjoyed The Romance of Ants exhibit.

Ants build their homes to accommodate the number of individuals in the colony. This means that a new ant colony has a smaller (less deep) nest tunneling system and older, larger colonies have larger (and deeper) intricate tunneling systems. From the work on my colleague, Dr. Walter Tschinkel of Florida State University, we know that ant species have species specific plans for digging their nests. This means that each individual colony in a species will dig a very similar pattern under the ground for their nests, which are often quite different than other ant species nests.

To start a nest or colony in the first place, a new mated queen flies around to find a suitable location. She likely looks for the right soil, temperature, food resources nearby, and other variables to decide where to start digging. Once she has started her colony, she relies on her daughters (worker ants) to do the digging, foraging for food, caring for the young larvae, and most everything in the nest. The queen then takes on the role of reproduction and does very little else in the nest.

Keep looking at the ground and watching the ants!
Corrie Moreau

[Dan Malcic]

I liked the Ant Exhibit at the Field Museum and it reminded me of something I have been wondering about.

I dig graves with a backhoe in a cemetery and sometimes when we dig there is a pre-need granite marker on the grave that we have to remove. When we take it out there is often what looks like an ant farm, many ants running around franticly and they appear to me to be upset that we have exposed them.

There crawling out of the tunnels and into each other and some are hauling little white things.

My question is what happens to the ants when they are dug up, put on a truck and dumped in another grave? Do they reorganize with other ants and form a colony?

[Corrie Moreau]

Dear Dan,

Glad you like the exhibit and thanks for visiting the website. 

Regarding your questions I will address them below, but also suggest you check out AntBlog (http://www.antweb.org/antblog/). 

Ants often build their homes under stones since the stones heat in the sun and make the nest warm.  The white things you see the ants carrying are their brood or larvae.  You can read more about this here. 

As for what happens when their nest gets moved to another location this will depend on whether the queen is moved with the nest or not.  You can read more here, here, and here. 

Enjoy the ants!

Corrie Moreau