{"id":8916,"date":"2023-11-19T18:16:15","date_gmt":"2023-11-19T18:16:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.adopteerregenwoud.nl\/?p=8916"},"modified":"2023-11-19T18:17:30","modified_gmt":"2023-11-19T18:17:30","slug":"leaf-cutter-ants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.adoptrainforest.com\/leaf-cutter-ants\/","title":{"rendered":"Leaf-cutter Ants"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Anyone who has traveled through the Americas knows them anyway, a stream of ants all carrying leaves with them. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">It looks like a mini highway that can go on for 30 meters. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">We&#8217;re talking about leaf-cutter ants of course. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">For tourists a source of amazement, for local farmers and vegetable gardeners a real plague that just eats your beloved trees and plants bare. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">By the way, did you know that there are 47 different species of leaf-cutter ants?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Many people think the ants cut off the leaves to eat for themselves, but nothing could be further from the truth. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">The ants cut off the leaves and transport them to a fungus in their nest. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">A partnership with quite a history, it turns out.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Bladsnijdermieren Costa Rica\" width=\"900\" height=\"506\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/h6DvjwmEnEg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">From survivor to farmer<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">But how does that fungus work and how did ants ever get there? <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">According to genetic research, Attini ants began farming about 50 million years ago. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Just for comparison, as humans we only started farming about 12,000 years ago. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">All 250 species of Attini ants known in the world breed fungi. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Among the leaf-cutter ants the fungus is completely domesticated, not found outside the nests and completely dependent on the good care of the ants. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Just as you shouldn&#8217;t let most dairy cows or lap dogs loose in a wild landscape anymore either.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Ants started farming at the same time that dinosaurs went extinct. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">When with the extinction of all kinds of plants, food was no longer so readily available, they switched to keeping fungi. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\"><span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">After<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">all<\/span><span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">,<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">those<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">did<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">like<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">the<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">conditions<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">at<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">the<\/span> <span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">time<\/span><span class=\"--l --r hover:bg-[#B4DAE8]\">.<\/span> <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">So it was a smart move by the ants to switch to fungi as a food source. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Meanwhile, the ants have physically evolved to the point where they can no longer live without the fungi.<\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Taking care of your food<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">When you look at a colony of ants, you quickly see that there are ants of all different sizes. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">The largest ants are the scouts, searching for suitable flowers and leaves, the middle ants use their powerful jaws to cut off and transport pieces of leaves. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Their mandibles vibrate up to 1,000 times per second for this purpose, so they are as effective as a chainsaw. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Over time, the mandibles wear out and at this point the ants change their job and become leaf carriers. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">The smallest ants chew the leaves into a mush that the fungus can digest. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">In addition, the smallest ants also nurse the fungus. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">The largest ants can weigh hundreds of times as much as the smallest ones. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">In addition, of course, there are many other roles such as queen, soldiers, waste pickers, leaf inspectors, pest control, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">As soon as a young queen starts her own colony, she takes a piece of the fungus from her old nest into her oral cavity. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">But it is difficult as a new queen to build a kingdom. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Many try, few succeed!<img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-8724 alignright\" src=\"https:\/\/www.adoptrainforest.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/Relatiebeheerder-300x150.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"150\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.adoptrainforest.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/Relatiebeheerder-300x150.png 300w, https:\/\/www.adoptrainforest.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/Relatiebeheerder.png 700w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<h3><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Top Athletes<br \/>\n<\/span><\/h3>\n<p><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">It&#8217;s a powerful thing they do, those leaf-cutting ants. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">In one night, they can strip an entire tree of its leaves. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Moreover, they can carry 10 to 50 times their own weight with their jaws. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">To put this into perspective, this is like trying to carry an adult grizzly bear between your teeth. <\/span><span class=\"--l --r sentence_highlight\">Although that one probably does struggle a bit more.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Anyone who has traveled through the Americas knows them anyway, a stream of ants all carrying leaves with them. It looks like a mini highway that can go on for 30 meters. We&#8217;re talking about leaf-cutter ants of course. For tourists a source of amazement, for local farmers and vegetable gardeners a real plague that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":8604,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"give_campaign_id":0,"h5ap_radio_sources":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[33,35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-animals-in-the-reserve","category-rainforest"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Leaf-cutter Ants - Adopteer Regenwoud<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.adoptrainforest.com\/leaf-cutter-ants\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Leaf-cutter Ants - Adopteer Regenwoud\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Anyone who has traveled through the Americas knows them anyway, a stream of ants all carrying leaves with them. 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