Recently in Ant identification Category

Hey,

I was just wondering if you knew what type of ants these critters are? I live in Florida if that helps.

K. Brown

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Hello,

These appear to be ghost ants (Tapinoma melanocephalum), a notorious so-called "tramp" species that is well-established in Florida. The species epithet melanocephalum literally means "brown head", owing to its distinctive bicoloration. Here is a previous post that addresses the role of ghost ants as pests in the home and also provides links to a number of articles that can tell you more about the appearance and ecology of this species.

Thanks,

Alexandra Westrich & the AntAsk Team

My 3 year old daughter found this insect on her bicycle
from Santa in Chile. I have contacted some local entomologists but this
specimen may be introduced. so, a more experienced entomologist may be
needed. My wife found your website and since you work with such a high
number of species, you may have a better understanding of what this
specimen may be or where to look.

It looks and behaves as an ant, but its head (rostrum) is quite
different as you will see. Any idea?
Gian

Dear Gian,

The insect that your daughter found looks a lot like an ant, but as you noticed, its head and mouthparts give it away as another type of insect mimicking an ant. All ants have mandibles that they can use for chewing in one way or another but this insect appears to have piercing mouthparts and is likely a member of a hemipteran group that look a lot like ants. We have several posts on ant mimics here, here, here, and here that you might find interesting.

Thanks for your question,
Ben Rubin & the AntAsk Team

Dear AntAsk,

I'm in Central Texas in Limestone County and photographed some ants that were behaving like leafcutter ants. But I have never seen ants with such huge spikes on their backs! Will you please tell me exactly what kind of ant these are?

Thanks!

Pamela

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Hey Pamela,

You're right! The ants in your photographs are indeed leafcutter ants. This particular species is Atta texana. All species of leafcutter (or fungus-farming) ants display a spiny exterior, as you point out, and in fact the number of these thoracic spines tells you the difference between the two "true" genera of leafcutters, Atta and Acromyrmex. Please see this previous post to learn more about the geographic distribution of leafcutter ants, and the second point of this post for an explanation of their spiny morphology.

Thanks for your interest!

Alexandra Westrich & the AntAsk Team

About a week ago at location Kandy, Sri Lanka round 7 in the evening local time (a little after sunset) I was observer of a fantastic scenery with some rather large insect. They were attracted by the light in the room, and in very short time, there were hundreds flying round the lamps. Suddenly over few minutes, they landed, dropped their four wings and mated, where after the male died and the female disappeared - I didn´t see where, as I was occupied taking photos.
The length of the insect was round 10 mm, and the wingspans round 30-40 mm. A local told me that this happened at few times a year. Somehow it's was like when ants are mating in my country, but I do not find the animals very ant like.

I add a few pictures showing the experience. I'm great full for any informations regarding these insects.

Allan Bergmann Jensen

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Dear Allan,

Thanks for your detailed descriptions and great photography work concerning the termite queens that were mating in your kitchen! You were right, there are some very distinct differences between the termites in your kitchen and the ants you may have seen mating previously in your life.

If you'd like to know more about the differences between ants and termites, here is a good blog previously written on how to distinguish them.

As you can see in your pictures, the insects in question have broad waists, a pair of forewings and hindwings of roughly equal size (and almost double the body size), and beadlike antennae. This makes them termites!

Good luck on your future identification!

-Max Winston & the AntAsk team

Hi,

I found this in my yard, Western Australia near Perth. It's about 33mm long and I'm intrigued to find out what it is.

Please view the picture here.

Kind regards,
William

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William,

Fantastic picture! This insect is in fact a wasp from the family Tiphiidae, commonly called flower wasps or simply tiphiid wasps.

This particular specimen is a female Thynnine wasp. All female species of the subfamily Thynninae are wingless and can often be seen scaling an elevated structure like a flower or a tree (or in your case, a fence) in order to catch the attention of a passing male. Unlike females, Tiphiid males do have wings and will literally sweep the receptive female off her feet for an extended in-flight mating ritual that also involves treating the female to several easy meals along the way (flower nectar being much more accessible from the air).

Winglessness in female tiphiid wasps finally proves useful when, after mating, the gravid female must burrow underground to find a suitable repository for her eggs, namely scarab beetle larvae. Interestingly, winglessness or brachyptery (reduced wings) in wasps often goes hand in hand with this kind of parasitism and occurs in at least eight other wasp families. This frequently leads to confusion with ants, of course, but you can consult our post on one particularly notorious wasp family with wingless females, the mutillids (deceptively referred to as velvet ants), to learn more about some of the differences.

Thanks for your query,

Alexandra Westrich & the AntAsk Team

Hi,
I was in Corcovado National Park in Costa Rica where I took this photo (sorry about the quality) of what I think is Camponotus sericeiventris. As you can see, the ant is walking over a sticky, black substance with no apparent problem. The whole trunk of the tree was covered in this substance - is it anything to do with the ants?

Many thanks
Alan

*****
Alan,

Thank you for contacting AntBlog and including an image. We contacted an expert on the ants of Costa Rica, Dr. John T. Longino, to address your question. Here is what Dr. Longino had to say:

"Your ant is indeed Camponotus sericeiventris. I've often seen tree trunks with black, sticky, oozy areas, and ants often seem to be attracted to them. I have always surmised that these are tree infections, a result of wounds and/or pathogens, and that the tree sap is oozing out and evaporating, making a sweet exudate that ants might like. I doubt that the ants are the cause of the exudate.

From the look of your image, the area looks wet but not super sticky. Ants have no problem walking over wet surfaces. Also, if a sticky surface gets a "skin" of moisture or dryness, that would make it easy for an insect to walk over. We might touch a surface and break that thin surface layer, contacting the sticky material below. So a surface that seems sticky to us might not be to an insect.

By the way, I did my graduate work in Corcovado, back in early 1980's, and developed my love of ants there."

John "Jack" Longino (guest expert), Corrie Moreau & the AntAsk Team

Hi,

I was wondering if you could help in identifying the attached ant image.

The ant was pictured in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania at about 15-20mm of length.

Thanks
Muhammad

Dear Muhammad,

Thank you for your question! The picture you provided is great, which helps for identification! Since you are in Tanzania, we have contacted an expert on insects in the area, Peter Hawkes, for help. Here is what he said:

"The photo is of a major worker of a Camponotus species, in the subgenus Tanaemyrmex . The taxonomy of the genus Camponotus in Africa is simply not well enough resolved for me to attempt a more definite identification than this."

The genus Camponotus is very large with about 1,058 extant species (www.antweb.org) and the identification to the species level is often challenging. Click here to see all Camponotus on antweb.

All the best,
Peter Hawkes (guest expert), Steffi Kautz & the AntAsk Team

I took pictures of 2 Guardian Ants working Woolly Aphids. I am trying to find the name of the ant species that is acting as guardian to this mass of Woolly Aphids, Prociphilus tessellatus, on a growing Alder shrub next to a lake.

The area this Speckled Alder is growing in is very sparse during the winter with snow and ice licking at its branches. Where would these ants keep these aphids over the winter? Do aphids, and ants have sort of anti-freeze in there system that kicks in during the winter?

Since this was on a lake shore, and at the end of a wooded hill to the lake, do I need to be concerned relative to my plants about 500 feet away? If so what do you suggest?

Thank you,
Richard and Meghan
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Dear Richard and Meghan,

Thank you for contacting AntBlog and send such nice photographs. This certainly helps with identifications. Since you are in New England, we reached out to an expert in the area, Stefan Cover, for help. Here is what he said:

"Those ants are Camponotus noveboracensis. The Camponotus are frequent aphid tenders but we know nothing about the relationship between these ants and that particular aphid. No need to worry about plants 500 feet away, though."

In addition, if you would like to read more about what ants do in the winter, please see our previous post here.

Best regards,
Stefan Cover (guest expert), Corrie Moreau & the AntAsk Team

I don't know where to start with this critter - ant or wasp? Any info would be greatly appreciated. Eastern Washington state elev. 2900' sage biome, about 1/2" long, solitary foraging (frantically) on ground with short bursts of flight, eventually disappeared down a hole. Thank you much!

Jack


Hi Jack,

Thanks for reaching out. Although the picture is a bit blurry for complete identification, your description seems to suggest that the insect is a wasp rather than an ant. Most queens and males have wings, but these are usually used strictly during the mating period. Because male ants are drones and don't forage--they just eat, mate, and die--it isn't likely a male ant from your description. Likewise, as most queens shed their wings after nuptial flight, it is unlikely that this is a queen using her wings to forage around the nest. Additionally, considering there wasn't any mention of others in the vicinity, it is more likely that it is a wasp, which live a more solitary lifestyle than most ants.

Although I am not an expert on wasps, the picture you sent looks remarkably close to a red-tailed spider hunter wasp. A pictoral list of Eastern Washington wasps can be found here.

Happy hunting!
Max Winston & the AntAsk Team

Hi, I would like to know if someone can identify the species of the ant colony I found next to my house. I am planning to build a formicarium and I would like to know how big it should be to hold this colony. What kind of food do they eat? I have noticed that some of them were pretty big... are they queens?

Thanks
Andreas (Brazil)

Hi Andreas,

Thanks for contacting us. It is a bit difficult to tell what these ants are from just pictures but they may be a species in the extremely diverse genus, Pheidole. Pheidole are common and are usually strongly dimorphic as this species appears to be. Dimorphism means that there are two distinct size classes of workers; major (large) and minor (small). Other types of ants can also be dimorphic or have a more continuous range of sizes (polymorphism). The larger workers are often useful for carrying large food items and are sometimes helpful for defending colonies. So the big individuals that you see are the major workers, not queens. We have a great post on how to build ant farms and take care of ants here and several other posts that discuss keeping ants here. There are around 1,000 species of Pheidole and we don't know what most of them eat exactly but these posts provide guidelines for generalized ant diets that should work well.

Good luck!
Ben Rubin & the AntAsk Team