Queen Ants

Images of the female reproductive caste.

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Acromyrmex versicolor foundress queens in an incipient fungus garden. This species is normally polygynous during the colony founding stage, but reverts to single-queen colonies after the first workers emerge.

Tucson, Arizona, USA

A Desert Leafcutter queen (Acromyrmex versicolor) tends to larvae in an incipient fungus garden.

Tucson, Arizona, USA

Mating Acropyga epedana ants, the queen carrying a mealybug in her mandibles. Acropyga live nearly entirely by consuming secretions of root-feeding mealybugs, and the mealybugs depend on the ants for dispersal and protection. When young queen ants leave the nest to mate and start new colonies, they take a mealybug with them.

Portal, Arizona, USA

Portrait of a social parasite, Aphaenogaster tennesseensis.

Urbana, Illinois, USA

A young Aphaenogaster picea foundress queen with her first batch of eggs.

South Bristol, New York, USA

Worker, queen, and brood of an eastern woodland Aphaenogaster species.

South Bristol, New York, USA

This parasitic Aphaenogaster tennesseensis queen has just penetrated a nest of her host species, Aphaenogaster rudis. She is highly attractive to her victims, who unknowingly tend her and begin raising her eggs as their own. The original host queen killed, this colony will gradually turn into a full nest of A. tennesseensis.

Manhattan, Kansas, USA

Socially parasitic ants are usually discernable by their relatively small queens, as ants that start new colonies by infiltrating existing nests do not need large body reserves. The queen of Aphaenogaster tennesseensis- a temporary nest-founding parasite of several other woodland Aphaenogaster- is scarcely larger than her own workers.

Urbana, Illinois, USA

A queen leafcutter ant (Atta texana) dwarfs her daughter workers.

Captive colony at the University of Texas

Acromyrmex versicolor foundress queens in an incipient fungus garden. This species is normally polygynous during the colony founding stage, but reverts to single-queen colonies after the first workers emerge.

Tucson, Arizona, USA

Canon EOS 20D |

More details: exif |

Original size: 3504x2336 |

Current: 800x534 |

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Keywords: queen fungi nest fungus insect insects evolution larvae versicolor ecology brood entomology formicidae mutualism myrmicinae attini acromyrmex polygyny pleiometrosis polygyne

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Queen Ants

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