The Garden Ant
The black or garden ant is the commonest British ant to enter
houses and it is found in almost all parts of the country. The worker
is very dark brown, almost black and about 5mm long. The queen, which
is rarely seen except for certain months in the Summer, is about 15mm
long and mid-brown in colour.
Where do they live?
The queen makes the nest in the soil, in grassed areas beneath paving
and patios and sometimes in hollow trees. The nests are usually outside
buildings although sometimes they may be found in the walls or foundations
of a house. The gregarious habits of ants have resulted in the development
of a caste system, whereby individuals are responsible for specialised
duties within the community. There are : workers (sterile females) ;
fertile males ; and queens (fertile females). The worker ants build and
extend the nest, look after larval forms and forage for food, whereby
they become pests. The queens do none of these duties, but remain almost
exclusively within the nest. Mating amongst sexual individuals takes
place on the wing. These spectacular swarms involve large numbers of
ants and take place between mid-July and mid-September. The actual swarms
only persist for 2-3 hours. After mating the males perish but the females
shed their wings and dig a cell in the soil where they over winter. The
eggs are laid in late spring and the white leg less larvae hatch 3-4
weeks later. The larvae are fed on secretions from the queens salivary
glands until full grown, when they will pupate, forming the well known "ants
eggs”. From these pupae emerge the first brood of worker ants.
These workers take over foraging duties and tend subsequent broods. The
sexual forms are not produced until late summer. The entire cycle takes
about 2 months to complete. Under favourable conditions a nest may persist
for several years.
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What do they eat?
The foraging workers follow well defined trails to their feeding grounds,
which may be many metres from the nest following well-defined paths in
and clustering around the food source. Sweet foods are preferred. Ants
prefer dry areas. They also cultivate greenfly, in order to obtain the
sugary honeydew secretions that these aphids produce. They enter buildings,
often through very narrow crevices, and if one ant finds food, there
will soon be many others. Pheromone trials are left which other ants
(some from different nests) pick up, the information as to the whereabouts
of food in communicated to other ants in the nest. Ants foraging for
food in houses may cause considerable nuisance to the householder & once
trials have been left they are difficult to eradicate without professional
help.
Ant Swarms
The emergence of numerous winged ants (usually on a hot day in Summer)
can cause alarm to some people, particularly if these 'flying ants'
are emerging inside a building. These flying ants may be a nuisance,
but they are harmless and nothing can be done to stop them swarming
but treatment with insecticides will control the swarms. Infestations
as these are common when the humidity is high then swarms will occur
over a wide area. This is so Queens & Drones from one nest will
mate with Queens & Drones from other nests. After mating the Drones
die and each Queen will attempt to start her own nest. The mortality
rate of Queens is extremely high with only a few out of several thousand
surviving to start nests. |
