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Ant War
Posted: Mon Aug 03, 2015 8:50 pm
by Cormac
I was taking a walk and looking for queens when i came upon a massive ant war. I am relatively new to anting so I could not identify the ants involved. It looked interesting so i thought i would share it. I captured a few queens that were caught up in the battle but i don't think they were mated, I guess i will find out. Here is the video.
https://youtu.be/-RiMgPdbUx0
Re: Ant War
Posted: Sat Aug 08, 2015 1:02 pm
by Rovvov99
The red coloured ants are Formica Sanguinea, better known as the "slavemaker ant". The black ants are probably Formica fusca. What you witnessed is called a broodraid , Formica Sanguinea does this in the summer months only. They will invade a nest of another, weaker species (often Formica fusca), kill all the workers and steal their brood to bring it back to their own colony and raise the brood there as slaves. It is an really interesting specie, I had them once but unfortunately they escaped. Maybe you can catch some queens when they have their nuptial flight.
Re: Ant War
Posted: Sat Aug 08, 2015 3:04 pm
by Ants4fun
I agree, lucky you!
Re: Ant War
Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2015 10:59 am
by Cormac
That is very interesting! Formica Sanguinea must be very common in my area. I found another nest yesterday, I followed a trail of them carrying brood. At the nest it looked like multiple species of ant workers.
Re: Ant War
Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2018 6:43 pm
by AntsDakota
Rovvov99 wrote: ↑Sat Aug 08, 2015 1:02 pm
The red coloured ants are Formica Sanguinea, better known as the "slavemaker ant". The black ants are probably Formica fusca. What you witnessed is called a broodraid , Formica Sanguinea does this in the summer months only. They will invade a nest of another, weaker species (often Formica fusca), kill all the workers and steal their brood to bring it back to their own colony and raise the brood there as slaves. It is an really interesting specie, I had them once but unfortunately they escaped. Maybe you can catch some queens when they have their nuptial flight.
Polyergus is a slave maker ant too. It usually raids the nests of Formica argentea and Formica fusca. Fire ants also perform this brood-napping behavior, except on their own species.