New World Army Ant

Fascinating facts about the New World Army Ant

• Eciton burchellii raids can stretch up to 200 metres and involve as many as 200,000 workers, creating a massive moving front across the forest floor. The column is kept together by pheromone trails that the ants lay as they advance. Each raid can be up to 20 metres wide and is repeated every day during the fifteen-day nomadic phase of the colony's cycle.
• More than 500 different species live in the vicinity of an Eciton colony, and over 300 of those rely entirely on the ants for food or shelter, the highest known association for any single species. Among these are numerous antbirds that follow the raids and catch fleeing prey, parasitic mites that live on the ants, and beetles that either mimic the ants or feed on their refuse.
• Instead of building a permanent nest, Eciton burchellii forms a bivouac, a living structure made of thousands of interlinked workers that can be taken apart and carried to a new site each night. The bivouac is composed of hanging live worker bodies and can be disassembled and relocated during colony emigrations.
• A single colony can contain between 100,000 and 600,000 adult ants. Colonies may be quite large, accommodating as many as 100,000 to 600,000 adult individuals, and each colony consists of a single queen, a brood of developing young, and many adult workers.
• When the colony shifts to a new bivouac, the entire living nest is moved in six to eight hours, usually under cover of darkness. On average, it takes a colony six to eight hours to move their bivouac, and this occurs primarily during the night.

Sources

Every fact above was checked against these pages, and kept only where one of them states it.

• Wikipedia

At a glance

About the New World Army Ant

As the New World Army Ant marches across the forest floor, its dark, serpentine columns weave through the underbrush with relentless purpose, a mesmerizing spectacle of collective energy and precision. With each individual ant a tiny but vital cog in the machine, the colony moves as one, a fluid, pulsing entity that devours all in its path, from unsuspecting insects to small vertebrates. In this ceaseless, nomadic tide, we witness the awe-inspiring power of cooperation and adaptability that has allowed Eciton burchellii to thrive as a formidable, apex predator in its domain.

More insects and spiders to discover

Browse Feravox