Acromyrmex balzani, a leafcutter ant, transports cut grass back to her nest.

Paraguay
Male leaf-cutting ants (Acromyrmex versicolor) lek above the desert floor, awaiting virgin queens who fly into the swarm to mate.  This species flies during the Arizona summer monsoon season, early in the morning after a soaking rain.

Tucson, Arizona, USA
A desert leafcutter, Acromyrmex versicolor, carrying a leaf back to her nest.

Tucson, Arizona, 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
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
Acromyrmex coronatus, cutting through a leaf.

Panamá
The birth of an ant-fungus garden, with newly-laid ant eggs and the early stages of fungal growth.  Leaf-cutting ant colonies subsist entirely on their cultivated fungus. (Acromyrmex versicolor) 

Tucson, Arizona, USA
Male leaf-cutting ants (Acromyrmex versicolor) lek above the desert floor, awaiting virgin queens who fly into the swarm to mate.  This species flies during the Arizona summer monsoon season, early in the morning after a soaking rain.

Tucson, Arizona, USA
Acromyrmex balzani, a leafcutter ant, transports cut grass back to her nest.

Paraguay
Acromyrmex balzani, a leafcutter ant, transports cut grass back to her nest.

Paraguay
Acromyrmex balzani, a leafcutter ant, transports cut grass back to her nest.

Paraguay
See photo in original gallery.
all images and text © Alex Wild 2001-2013