Harvester/weaver/leaf Cutter Ants

The harvester ants have been named so as they harvest seeds of different types of grasses and mainly belong to messor,Pognomyrmex  and Pheidole genera.These can be easily spotted in a garden,park or lawn where they create corridors or passages on land which look like passages created by repeated movements of humans.The ants collect grass seeds,remove their plumule,so that they don’t germinate and store them in well- kept nest godowns.After consumption,the hard seed coats are thrown out of the nests and can be noticed in abundance outside their nests.

Weaver ants as the name suggests they weave nest with leaves.One of the  prominent groups in this category is Oecophylla.These can be spotted on mango,citrus and guava trees and are quite ferocious in nature.These ants exhibit marvelous architecture and intelligent to build their nest with leaves.The workers capture their larvae quite delicately in their jaws and move them to and fro on the edges of young tender leaves,in response to this movement or timgling feeling,the alrvea telease sticky material from their glands.Then  the other workers fold these leaves and join them with secreted glue.To join the two leaves which are quite apart,ants form chains by holding each other’s waists and thus pull the leaves together.Weaver ants are used in biological control to increase fruit yield and their brood is used in Chinese soups,drugs,as food andas aphrodisiac in many parts of the world.

English: Leaf cutter ants

Leaf cutter ants is a group contains about 47 species belonging to the genera Atta and Acromyrmex.thee are ardemic  to cental,South America,Mexico and United states.Leaf- cutter ants initiated agriculture much earlier as compared to the human species.These ants bring fresh leaves and plant cuttings into their nests;which are further cut into smaller pieces and are treated with ants fecal liquid.Then these are the nest where fungus is cultivated to digest leaf cellulose.The most interesting part if the story is that if even the most advanced human species is forced to live with fungus culture,it may not be bear the brunt of pathogens,but these suoerorganisms,are least susceptible to such infections.The resistance developed is unparalleled in any form of life.