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What's That Bug? does not endorse extermination

Texas Leaf Cutter Ant

Texas Leaf Cutter Ant – Atta texana (Buckley)
August 24, 2009
Found a pile of leaf confetti at the base of a Shumard Oak in my yard, followed the trail for about 20 yards then it went under the fence. There were no ants, found out they operate at night and took some pictures this morning around 4:30. They may just defoliate my tree! Looked them up on the Aggie Extension site and believe that I have correctly identified them.
Renee
Seguin, TX

Texas Leaf Cutter Ant

Texas Leaf Cutter Ant

Hi Renee,
We agree with your identification of a Texas Leaf Cutter Ant.  BugGuide also lists many additional common names, including Town Ant, Cut Ant, Parasol Ant, Fungus Ant and Night Ant.  Leafcutter Ant and Leafcutting Ant are also used. BugGuide also states:  “Food  In Texas these ants damage weeds, grasses, plum and peach trees, blackberry bushes and many other fruit, nut and ornamental plants as well as several cereal and forage crops. The ants do not eat the leaf fragments they collect, but take them into their underground nest where they use the material to raise a fungus garden. As the fungus grows, certain parts of it are eaten by the ants and fed to the larvae. This fungus is their only known source of food.Leaf cutting ants will attack pine trees but ordinarily they do little damage when other green plants are available. During the winter when green plant material is scarce, seedling pines are frequently damaged in parts of east Texas and west central Louisiana. Where ants are abundant, it is almost impossible to establish natural pine reproduction. In such sites, young pine seedlings often are destroyed within a few days unless the ants are controlled before planting.
Remarks  Leaf cutting ants live in large colonies of up to 2 million.“  We are also linking to the Forest Pests website that contains much information including this:  “Biology – The ants have a mating flight in May or June. After mating, the females establish nests beneath the soil and become the queens of the colonies. Worker ants carry the cut foliage and other vegetative material back to the nest, where it is used to culture the fungus that is their primary food.“

Posted 24 August 2009 § ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged:

Flying Ant from Thailand

Is it a male or a queen ant?
August 19, 2009
Found on my patio crawling on leaf of silver morning glory. Now I know why suddenly there are ants in the house after 3 years. Best educated guess is that they came from soil and/or plants I purchased. Worker ants are dark brown or black with the same color and light yellow or white stripes on the stomach.
Pong A.
Bangkok, Thailand

Flying Ant from Thailand

Flying Ant from Thailand

Dear Pong,
This Flying Ant is one of the reproductive kings or queens as worker ants do not possess wings.  We haven’t much knowledge on Asian species but perhaps one of our readers will be able to provide you with an exact identification. We are going to take a guess that this might be a reproductive Weaver Ant or Green Ant in the genus Oecophylla.  We did find a photo that seems to support that guess. Wikipedia also has an extensive pop culture page on the Green Ants of Thailand.

Posted 20 August 2009 § ‡ Comments (0) °

Flying Ant, but which one???

Katydid wasp party?
August 9, 2009
When I went out onto our deck this morning, I was greeted by a swarm of these small black insects. They seem to be congregating around our grill. After determining they didn’t seem to be intent on stinging us, my wife and I pulled out the flyswatters and began clearing the area. Yeah, this probably qualifies as unnecessary carnage, but there was no way we could enjoy our deck with 50 or so of them buzzing about.
From my searching, I think it’s a katydid wasp. There doesn’t seem to be much information about them other than lots of pictures. Should I be looking for a nest nearby?
John
Marion, IA

Flying Ant, we presume

Male Flying Ant

Hi John
This is not a Katydid Wasp.  We believe it is a reproductive Flying Ant, but we need assistance as to the family, genus and or species.  We will solicit assistance in this matter.  The jury is still out regarding Unnecessary Carnage as there may have been a justifiable reason to remove this nuptial swarm.  We have been getting so much heat lately in the Unnecessary Carnage arena that we don’t want to be hasty in this situation.

Flying Ant: Justifiable death or not???

Flying Ant: Justifiable death or not???

Update from Eric Eaton
You’re welcome.
Yes, the winged ant is a male, subfamily Formicinae….looks like genus Formica.  What the person describes is swarming behavior (aka “nuptial flight”) that was probably a “one night only” event.
Eric

Thanks Eric,
We will link to the genus Formica on BugGuide.  Ants perform a vital service with regards to the balance of nature, and native ants are often compromised by the introduction of exotic species that throw things out of balance, like the introduction of Argentine Sugar Ants in many places of the world.  We don’t believe these mating ants constituted a threat, and if killing them could have been avoided by sweeping them out of the way, or by some other means, that was probably a better alternative to swatting.

Unnecessary Carnage Comment
August 9, 2009
RE: unnecessary carnage
I love your site, and visit it several times a day. Many thanks for posting such lovely images and so much information (you helped me ID a one-eyed Sphinx moth here in Seattle)! I also love the fact that you tell folks when they have committed an act of unnecessary carnage, but sadly, you have been very hesitant to do so lately… Please don’t let one or two unhinged people keep you from providing a vital service- letting humans know that insects are innocent until proven guilty!
Leah S.

Posted 09 August 2009 § ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: ,
What's That Bug? does not endorse extermination

Winged Carpenter Ant

Stung in my Bed!
August 8, 2009
I was crawling into the bed for the night, and something sharp poked me like a needle jabbed into my foot. I lifted up my sheets and a black flying thing hovered over my head. It was kinda like a carpenter ant that flys and stings, but I didnt get a close enough look. What was it?
Please help so I can see what treatment I need to put on it! Thank you!!
Plymouth Minnesota

Winged Carpenter Ant

Winged Carpenter Ant

Dear Please help …,
We agree that this is a Winged Carpenter Ant, probably the Black Carpenter Ant, Camponotus pennsylvanicus which is pictured on BugGuide.  This is one of the reproductive adults after a nuptial flight that is in search of a new colony.  We do not dispense medical advice.

Posted 08 August 2009 § ‡ Comments (0) °

Carpenter Ants devour newly emerged Annual Cicada

Carpenter Ants Devour Emerging Cicada
July 29, 2009
Dear Bug Man:
Thought you might be able to use one of these photos in your “food chain’ category. My son called me over to an old oak tree, to see a group of carpenter ants eating what he thought was a large caterpillar. When I got there, I could see it was an emerging cicada. I don’t know if the cicada died as a result of not being able to emerge fully from it’s nymphal skin, and the ants were just scavenging the carcass. Or, if the ants started attacking it shortly after it crawled up the tree. No idea what type of cicade this one is, but parts of it were a lovely turquoise green. This was the only cicada on the whole tree–no other shells or nymphs were around. Was this cicada’s biological clock working OK?
Chris O.
Wildwood Park, near Toledo, OH

Carpenter Ants devour emergent Cicada

Carpenter Ants devour emergent Cicada

Hi Chris,
Thanks so much for sending us your wonderful food chain documentation of Carpenter Ants devouring an Annual Cicada that was in the process of metamorphosis.  We suspect the Carpenter Ants attacked the Cicada while it was helpless and unable to escape.  The Cicada’s biological clock was right on time, as they emerge during the summer.  This is an Annual Cicada, and unlike the Periodical Cicadas that emerge every 14 or 17 years, the Annual Cicadas emerge each year.

Posted 29 July 2009 § Cicadas ‡ Comments (1) ° Tagged:

Kleptoparasitic Flies from Australia pilfer an Ant from an Ant Hunter Spider

Kleptoparasitic flies
Thu, Mar 19, 2009 at 2:37 AM
Hi guys,
I got this photo of tiny flies trying to get to the ant captured by this jumping spider. Apparently they are Milichiidae (Diptera, Schizophora) some of which are kleptoparasitic of spiders, some specialising in ant snacks such as this one. The spider is a female Salticid, Zenodorus orbiculatus known locally as ant hunters. She is about 7mm long so you can see how tiny those flies are.
aussietrev
Queensland, Australia

Freeloader Flies share Ant Hunter's prey

Freeloader Flies share Ant Hunter's prey

Hi Trevor,
Though you have a long history of providing our site with awesome images of Australian fauna, this image is, in our opinion, one of the most fascinating. The fact that you captured this nuanced example of Kleptoparasitism is phenomenal. One animal stealing food or prey from another is common in the animal kingdom, and it is easily observed in our own brand new aquarium, but to photograph these minuscule creatures evolutionarily adapted to this activity is nothing short of fantastic. These Freeloader Flies, as they are called on one website, in the family Milichiidae, are described by Irina Brake on the Introduction to Milichiidae website: “Thu, 2009-02-12 13:48 — Irina Brake
The Milichiidae (Diptera, Schizophora) are small, mostly black acalyptrate flies. The family contains about 240 described species in 19 genera and is worldwide in distribution.
The behavior of several species of Milichiidae is very specialized. For example, in some species the adults are myrmecophilous (= ant-loving), whilst in some others they are kleptoparasitic, feeding on the prey of spiders or predaceous insects.
The habitats of Milichiidae are diverse. Adults can be collected in open landscapes, such as steppes or meadows, in wadis, at the edges of forests, inside forests, in the forest canopy, in stables or houses, or even in caves. However, they do not seem to be attracted to coastal habitats or to other places near water.
The Milichiidae are divided into three subfamilies, Madizinae, Milichiinae, and Phyllomyzinae.
Common names
Common names are only rarely cited for Milichiidae and seem to be more of an invention of the author than a commonly used name. The English term “filth flies”, for example, which is sometimes used for Milichiidae, was introduced by Sabrosky (1959) in the title of a paper about the genus Meoneura , which now belongs to the family Carnidae. Sabrosky probably used the general expression “filth fly” to describe the biology rather than intending the term to be a common name for the family Milichiidae. The term “filth flies” is generally used for several different taxa associated with ‘filth’.
Since people keep stumbling over the name ‘Milichiidae, I herewith introduce a new english common name: “freeloader flies”. The name refers to the biology of Milichiidae. Definitions for ‘freeloader’ are: ‘ someone who takes advantage of the generosity of others’ ( wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn ) or ‘ one who depends on another for support without reciprocating’ ( http://www.answers.com ). ”
BugGuide also has information on the family Milichiidae. The Geocities website has some nice images of the Ant Eater Spider or Ant Hunter Spider, Zenodorus orbiculatus.

Correction: Mon Mar 23, 2009  7:08:13 AM America/Los_Angeles
Dear Daniel,
thanks for alerting me to your photo and citing my webpage. However, I
discussed it with a collegue of mine and we both think that your flies
are Chloropidae, not Milichiidae. Michael von Tschirnhaus is a
Chloropidae specialist and has more experience with actually watching
the live flies than I have. He wrote to me that from the habitus the
flies are certainly Chloropidae. There are several species who are
kleptoparasitic on spiders. He doesn’t know all Australian genera, so he
can’t tell you which genus it is. Many species of different genera
develop in spider cocons and stay with the spider for a longer period of
time. They can wait endless in the spider net.
Best wishes,
Irina

Posted 21 March 2009 § Flies § Jumping Spiders ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: ,

Meat Ants devour Scarab Beetle in Australia

Food Chain Meat ants v Scarab beetle
Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 9:37 PM
Our Australian meat ants, Iridomyrmex purpereus, are omnivorous and quite as happy eating the flowers off my zucchinis as any hapless critter that stays still long enough. Farmers will sometimes use a nest as a disposal system for animal carcasses. A nest may have around 85000 ants and they can reduce a full size cow to just bones in about three days. Their bite does not sting but they will chomp on you if you are in their way in bare feet.. This scarab beetle, Exochogenys nigripennisare, will be little more than a snack.
aussietrev
Queensland, Australia although widespread

Meat Ants devour Scarab Beetle in Australia

Meat Ants devour Scarab Beetle in Australia

Wow Trevor,
Thanks for the exciting documentation of the Australian Meat Ants and the Scarab which you have identified as Exochogenys nigripennis.

Posted 11 December 2008 § Scarab Beetles ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: ,

Argentine Sugar Ant Question

big ant in line among smaller ants?
Sun, Oct 26, 2008 at 10:03 PM
Hi,
Every summer ants find their way into my house, and I’ve noticed for the past couple of years that there’s often a single larger/longer ant among the line of regular smaller ones. Always just one though. Who is this guy & what does he do? Usually the bigger ant is about 2-3 times the size of the others with an extra long abdomen, and moves slower; the one in the pictures from this year has a shorter/more proportional abdomen than others I’ve seen, moved faster, and behaved differently than other “big brother” ants in the past — instead of lumbering along in line with the others back and forth, this year’s walked for a bit then stayed in one spot, where the smaller ants congregated around it every so often.
In the past, the bigger ant hasn’t behaved any differently than the others, except for moving slower.
I couldn’t find any information on the internet about this (maybe because I wasn’t sure what to search for!) so any info would be appreciated. I just want to know why it’s so huge!
thanks!
michele.
los angeles, ca

Argentine Ants

Argentine Ants

Hi Michele,
We have always called these Argentine Sugar Ants, but Charles Hogue calls them simply Argentine Ants in his book Insects of the Los Angeles Basin. We have been meaning to photograph our own home invasions, but never seem to have a camera ready when 100s of ants discover bits of food in the sink or the cat food. We can honestly say that no species of insect annoys us more than the Argentine Ant, Iridomyrmex humilis or Linepithema humile according to BugGuide, and may one day post some of our anecdotes about various funny home invasions in years past. Here is what Hogue writes about this species. “This is our most common ant, the little blackish species (its length is 1/8 in., or 3 mm) that invades our homes and yards in search of food and water. Abundant in urban areas, it develops to prodigious numbers, and single colonies may harbor thousands of workers. It often becomes particularly noxious at the onset of cool weather in the fall, when colonies converge and move to sheltered, warmer quarters under homes, and foraging columns begin to seek food indoors. The Argentine Ant is, as its name suggests, native to South America (Argentina and Brazil), and it is an undesirable alien in our country. It was apparently introduced into New Orleans before 1891 in coffee shipments from Brazil, and it has since spread rapidly over much of the United States. The species is one of the most presistent and troublesome of all our house-infesting ants. Argentine Ant workers seek out and feed on almost every type of food, although they are especially fond of sweets. Making themselves most objectionable, the ants invade the house through minute crevices and cracks — filing along baseboards, across sinks, and over walls and tables in endless trails. they also have another undesirable habit: by protecting and tending scale insects and aphids, worker ants foster these injurious garden pests. Shallow nests are made in the ground, often under rocks or wood; the galleries extend only to depths of 6 to 7 inches (15 to 18 cm) below the surface. there may be a number of queens in a single colony. The Argentine Ant is a highly competitive species and is quick to exterminate other species of ants, including natives, in territory that it has just invaded this ant has no sting; its bite is feeble but can be felt.” Many ants have a caste system with soldier ants. We are uncertain if the Argentine Ant has soldier ants. Perhaps a reader can provide that information. We suspect, as this is the onset of cooler weather, your larger ant may be a queen in search of a new home. We have noticed a similar situation with a single larger ant in our own home invasions. BugGuide supports that with this information: “Winged queens mate once with a winged male, after which they can continuously produce fertile eggs for as long as 10 years- until death. Unlike most ants, several productive queens of this species can share the same colony, with one or more leaving with some of the workers to form a new colony when it gets crowded (this is known as ‘budding’).”

Argentine Ants

Argentine Ants

Posted 28 October 2008 § ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged:

Mexican Edible Leafcutter Ant

Mexican Edible Leafcutting Ant (wingless) in Cuernavaca, Morales, Mexico
Hi! I wrote you guys a few weeks back with these pictures, and i couldn’t figure out what kind of giant ants these were. I’ve now shrunk the pics down a little to make them more email friendly, and I was just re-skimming your site when I came across the Mexican Edible Leaf-Cutter ant. One reader (Diego) mentioned that he’s never been around to see them shed their wings before burrowing and starting a new colony. I was lucky enough to come across hundreds of them and I snapped a few pics… Had I known they tasted like bacon and pistachios I would’ve scooped a few up… Enjoy the pics!

Sorry we were unable to respond to your initial letter, but we are happy you identified your Mexican Leafcutter Ant without our direct assistance.

Posted 11 August 2008 § ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged:

Edible Leaf Cutter Ants

What is this bug?
We woke up this morning to find our house completely infested with these, a couple of hundred of them. Their bodies are about one inch long. They have four wings, the longer set being about two inches. They seem to have stingers. They were all sluggish when we woke up and found them. My husband was able to sweep them up without much trouble. Their wings make a very loud buzzing sound. We live on the Pacific coast in Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico. Thanks,
Jennifer

Hi Jennifer,
You have experienced the nuptial flight of king and queen edible Leaf Cutter Ants. They usually take flight after a summer rain.

Posted 10 July 2008 § ‡ Comments (0) °

Edible Leafcutter Ants

Edible Leaf-Cutter Ants
A little while back I received a package from an amazing person in Texas whom I met indirectly through www.Bugguide.net . This spectacular individual had agreed to try to harvest these winged alates [which emerge within a pretty specific time-window, kind of like cicadas but far less numerous]. Though at first it had seemed that we’d missed the window of opportunity, in the end I got OVER 2 POUNDS of these impressive and beautiful ants. They were shipped overnight to my Rhode Island home and arrived nicely chilled. I’ve tried them; while they’re tasty – unlike cicadas, their wings are largely inedible – I have yet to make them the delectable delicacies I know them to be. These ants are consumed in Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, and probably elsewhere. If anyone can suggest a good recipe (Roasting, baking? What spices, if any?) I’d be grateful for some advice. Thanks,
Dave
www.slshrimp.com

Thanks David,
We can always depend upon you for palette stimulating submissions.

Posted 24 July 2007 § ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged:

Carpenter Ant

want tio know
just want to know what type of ant this is it is an inch long thank you
allan mckee
Lewiston,ID

Hi Allan,
This is a Carpenter Ant in the genus Camponotus.

Posted 08 May 2007 § ‡ Comments (0) °

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