It is estimated that there are about 20 quadrillion ants on planet Earth, outnumbering humans around 2.5 million to one. These 20 quadrillion ants divide themselves into colonies. The average colony ranges from 20,000 to 100,000 ants and is often confined to a small space. However, there is one ant colony — the largest on Earth — that spans more than 3,700 miles. It is estimated to contain billions of ants. This massive colony is known as the Argentine ant supercolony. Keep reading to learn more about this incredible, and possibly even intercontinental, ant supercolony.
What Is an Ant Colony?
Ants can build their colonies just about anywhere.
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As mentioned earlier, there are almost countless ants in the world. They can live just about everywhere, including cities, fields, deserts, forests, and mountains, so they can build their colonies almost anywhere. Ants are highly social creatures, just like humans. They both work and live in these colonies.
Think of an ant colony like a family, albeit a massive one. The average ant colony has at least 20,000 ants, although the size is dependent on the species. Each colony is headed by a queen and includes her grown daughters, who are the workers, as well as her still-growing offspring.
How Does an Ant Colony Work?
All of the ants in a colony work together to survive.
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Ant colonies are highly structured and organized, to the point that some ants in a colony act as what’s called a “superorganism,” or a single organism. All the ants in a colony work together to survive. They do this by defending the colony, bringing in food, reproducing, and protecting the queen.
The role of a queen is to lay eggs, which she will spend most of her life doing. Most of the younger ants are dedicated to caring for her and her offspring. Meanwhile, the majority of the older ants venture outside the nest to defend it or search for food.
How Do Ants Communicate with Each Other?
Ants use pheromones to communicate with each other.
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To maintain the structure of their colonies, ants must be able to communicate with each other. Ants use their antennae to detect chemicals called pheromones, which is how they communicate. Worker ants release pheromones with distinct messages to inform other ants about what is happening.
Ants also carry these pheromones on their bodies, which allows them to recognize each other. They can also use touch to differentiate between other ants. The queen’s pheromones are unique to her, which sets her apart from the others.
Just as with human settlements, ants have been known to go to “war” with each other. They are loyal and friendly to those in their own colony but are hostile to outsiders. To protect their colony and themselves, worker ants may bite, sting, and spray invaders.
The History of the Argentine Supercolony
The Argentine supercolony spans more than 3,700 miles.
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The Argentine ant supercolony, the largest ant colony on Earth, is located in the Mediterranean region. It spans more than 3,700 miles, stretching from northern Italy through southern France and out to the western coast of Spain. It is interesting that the Argentine ant has established such a strong presence in the Mediterranean region, given that it originally hails from South America. How did it manage to travel so far?
These ants arrived in Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries after stowing away on ships and boats. The earliest known record of this ant dates to 1847, from the island of Madeira, which lies in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Portugal.
What Is so Special About the Argentine Ant Supercolony?
Argentine ants are known for being adaptable and resilient, but they are also invasive. They have established populations on six continents, including numerous countries and islands worldwide. Everywhere they have become established, they have either forced out the native ant species or destroyed them. While this could be considered typical behavior for aggressive ant species, the foreign Argentine ant is able to do this on an enormous scale due to the sheer size of the supercolony.
A foreign Argentine ant is one that lives in countries outside its native South America. For instance, all of the Argentine ants in the Mediterranean supercolony are considered foreign members of their species. Another factor that sets these foreign Argentine ants apart from their cousins in South America is that they have more than one queen in their colonies. This is one reason the Argentine ant supercolony has spread so quickly: they have many queens laying eggs at the same time.
Another aspect that makes this supercolony unique is its size. There are believed to be billions of ants residing in this colony. Scientists have theorized that the supercolony may not be limited to the Mediterranean region. After introducing Argentine ants from different parts of the world to each other, the scientists found that the ants recognized each other and were not aggressive.
As previously mentioned, this is uncommon behavior, as ants — even those from the same species — are typically hostile to “outsider” ants from other colonies. Because of this behavior, some scientists believe the ants may be descendants of the same ancestral colony, making this intercontinental supercolony the largest known animal society in the world.
