Meet The World's Strangest Ants (Part 2/3)

This is the second part of my "World's Strangest Ants" mini-series. Click here for part 1 in case you missed it! Update: Part 3 is out!

5# The Panda Ant

(credit)

Well, here's the thing with panda ants...They are not ants at all! Panda ants actually belong to the family Mutillidae which is comprised of more than 3,000 wasp species, whose wingless females resemble large, hairy ants. These wasps are generally known as velvet ants, due to dense hair that cover their body.

Usually, their color is bright scarlet or orange, but sometimes they look like the one depicted above! Those that are white & black, are called panda ants for obvious reasons. Some other colors these wasps come by include black, white, silver and gold.

These wasps have an extremely powerful sting that according to some rumors can even kill a cow, hence they are sometimes called "cow ant killers". However, this is just that, a rumor, although it's true that their sting is quite painful! How painful? Here's a man who decided to find out in the name of science:

Sidenote: Make sure to check his other videos too! He is getting stung by all kinds of insects, animals and even plants in purpose! I just love this guy, he is my hero!

6# The Dracula Ant

Adetomyrma venatrix (credit)

Ants of the species Adetomyrma venatrix are commonly known as "dracula ants" and that is for a very good reason as the queen and workers indulge in a behavior coined as "non-destructive cannibalism":

"The workers go out each day to capture prey, which they stun using venom, to bring back to the colony for the larvae to feed upon. It is the unique and bizarre feeding habits of the queen and workers, however, which has fascinated researchers. Hungry Dracula ants scratch and chew holes into their larvae and suck out the hemolymph, the ant equivalent of blood (4). This practice has been described as a form of ‘’, since the larvae are not killed by it." source

But this behavior is not the only weird thing about dracula ants. Their morphology is also quite peculiar. They are the only ants that have abdomens very reminiscent of those of wasps, from which ants are believed to have descended about 80 million years ago and some believe that they could be the ‘missing link’ in ant evolution!

7# The Alpha Male Ant

Cardiocondyla obscurior (credit)

So, the third weird ant of the day are the males of the Cardiocondyla obscurior ant species. What's really interesting about them is that each colony has only one dominant male that is always on the look out for other males. And what does he do when it spots a new one?

It sprays it with chemicals from his anus which to be honest is exactly what I do to male friends everytime I see them! This alerts the female workers to come and kill the wannabe alpha, if he hasn't already finished the job himself! Wish it worked the same with humans!

The alpha doesn't care about age, not even babies. Those that are only 1-day old really don't stand much chance as their exoskeleton has yet to harden so they are easy die by the mandibles of the alpha male.

Chances improve if they manage to stay undetected for 2 days or more. Their exoskeleton has become hard enough to withstand the bites of the alpha so they have some time to fight and sometimes win the alpha male in each own game.. Which is by farting him like he does, which results in the workers attacking him! Or sometimes, they fart each other and they are both killed by the workers! Which isn't much of a problem since there are always new males ready to come out of their pupae.

8# The Stinky Ant

Formicoxenus nitidulus (credit)

Today's last ant is Formicoxenus nitidulus also known as the shining guest ant. It's called "shining" because of its noticeably..shiny body. And it's called "guest" because it doesn't build colonies for itself, instead it lives in the colonies of other ants, stealing their food and other resources.

This isn't the only ant that does that. Parasitic ants use all kinds of smart methods to avoid being killed by the host colony, like chemical camouflage and mimicry. But these ants don't care much about blending! It simply tastes too bad to kill!

Every time a worker of the host colony grabs one with its' mandibles it spits it out due to its foul taste. With no other weapons to kill the parasitic ants (remember, ants don't have stings or any other way to kill enemies) there's not much they can do other than co-habit and keep their distance!

The End (For Now)

That's the end of part 2! Stay tuned for the third and last part that will come out tomorrow! Do you know of any other weird ants? I would love to hear them in the comments below! In the meantime, here's a cute ant:

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More Strange Animals

If you enjoyed reading this post I am sure you will love some of my previous work: