25 March 2009- Pachycondyla chinensis (Asian needle ants) preying on termites. This video (7:22 minutes-no audio) shows the ants chewing, licking, and carrying termites around. The termites appear to be alive (except for the one missing a head), but they have been been immobilized, possibly by the stings of the ants (video taped with Leica MZ16 microscope with 0.5 X objective at lowest magnification.

A video of Nylanderia fulva, tawny crazy ants, from Hancock County, MS, taken in the fall of 2009.

A short video of Nylanderia fulva, tawny crazy ants, that shows their frenetic nature.

Joe MacGpwm found this large colony of Formica integra under a large rock in the Cedars of Lebanon State Forest in central Tennessee during a collecting trip by the Mississippi Entomological Museum in 2009. These large red and black ants do not sting, but readily bite when disturbed. Workers also emit formic acid from the acidipore of the gaster (rear-end), which is quite acrid. It was actually difficult to breathe after moving the rock above their colony because of the strong smell!

Major and minor workers of Pheidole obscurithorax carrying a live caterpillar to their colony at the Weeks Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve in Baldwin, County, Alabama on September 29, 2014. Just a few seconds of video to give you an idea of how these workers cooperate to bring larger insects into their colony.

While at a recent invasive ant meeting in Mobile, Alabama, Joe MacGown wandered about a little and found 10 different invasive ant species including numerous colonies of the exotic Odontomachus haematodus, native to South America. These awesome ants are fairly large and capable of inflicting a nice sting. The workers walk around with their mandibles completely open, but when threatened, they can close their mandibles so rapidly that they can jump upward or backward. Here I have a few in a container and have place the tip of some forceps in with them. The ants did not take long to attack the forceps!!

Here’s a fun floating mass of imported hybrid fire ants (Solenopsis invicta x richteri) that Joe MacGown found on his farm pond in Sessums, Mississippi in early January, 2019. During flood events, fire ants are capable of clinging together in masses and floating about for days, and even weeks, until they can find their way back to dry land. This mass is entirely composed of live ants.

This is a short video of a Strumigenys pilinasis worker grooming itself. This is a tiny species that lives in leaf litter and is not seen by the average person.