Paratrechina longicornis - black crazy ant.  Along a sun-soaked beach on a Panamanian island, ants drink from nectaries on the underside of a leaf.  Many plants attract ants with nectaries, and the ants in return help remove the plant's herbivorous pests.

Isla Contadora, Panama
Paratrechina longicornis - black crazy ant.  Along a sun-soaked beach on a Panamanian island, ants drink from nectaries on the underside of a leaf.  Many plants attract ants with nectaries, and the ants in return help remove the plant's herbivorous pests.

Isla Contadora, Panama
Heteroponera imbellis 

Melrose, South Australia
Mycetosoritis hartmanni in their subterranean fungus garden.  The fungus- a white stringy material- grows between the bits of debris fed to it by the ants.  The ants then feed from the fungus- a true agricultural system.

Smithville, Texas, USA
Mycetosoritis hartmanni in their subterranean fungus garden.  The fungus- a white stringy material- grows between the bits of debris fed to it by the ants.  The ants then feed from the fungus- a true agricultural system.

Smithville, Texas, USA
Atta cephalotes

Gamboa, Panama
Major and minor workers of Atta cephalotes demonstrating the size extremes among worker ants in a single leafcutter ant colony.

Captive colony at the University of Illinois
Leafcutter ants make characteristic circular cuts. Here an ant completes the curve. (Atta cephalotes)

Captive colony at the University of Texas
Atta cephalotes leafcutter ants are true agriculturalists, farming an edible fungus (visible here as a white mold) in underground chambers.

Captive colony at the California Academy of Sciences
Leafcutter ants make characteristic circular cuts. Here an ant completes the curve. (Atta cephalotes)

Captive colony at the University of Texas
Leafcutter ants make characteristic circular cuts. Here an ant completes the curve. (Atta cephalotes)

Captive colony at the University of Texas
Leafcutter ants make characteristic circular cuts. Here an ant completes the curve. (Atta cephalotes)

Captive colony at the University of Texas
See photo in original gallery.
all images and text © Alex Wild 2001-2013