Ants are well equipped for combat ,armed with a pair of powerful mandibles and an arsenal of poisonous chemicals.
Not only do they fight and kill the small insect on which they prey,ants must also defend their colonies against those that prey on them,including birds,lizards,termites and some mammals.
The tiny warriors most common opponents,however,are other ants.As a colony expands,its workers must venture increasingly farther from the nest to collect enough food for the growing population.Sooner or later,they are bound to trespass on another colony's territory.The resulting territorial battles can pit armies of different species or the same species often end with a fight to the death.Sometimes the victors even carry their dead enemies back to the nest for food.
Black carpenter ants from warring nest confront each other by displaying their mandibles and raising their thoraxes.
During territorial battles,so many ants are killed that their bodies lie in heaps after the fight.
Twice the size of its attackers,a black mountain ant struggles in vain against several red ants as they bite it to death.The smaller ants' superior numbers prevent their larger victim from retailiating effectively.
Yellow tail ants spray a sticky poisonous liquid,secreted by Dufour's gland,at their enemies.The ant's swivelling abdomen allows it to aim the venom.
The ant's mandibles of jaws are among its most effective weapons.Varying in shape and size from one species to the next.mandible can hold or pinch an enemy in a vicelike grip.Some mandibles are sharp enough to slice through an enemy's skin or shell,other can crush or even clip off a limb.
Poison also play a major role in ant combat.
Some families of ants are equipped with stingers in the tip of their abdomen.These powerful attack weapon inject venoms potent enough to kill other insects.So fierce is the sting of some species,such as those of the Paraponera genus of south America,that it can be crippling even to humans.
Other ants have no stingers but eject their poison as a spray.The venom's main ingredient,formic acid,causes burning and itching in humans and is particularly effective against small animals.
Nesting in mounds of fallen larch needles,the Formica yessensis ant is particularly adapt at repelling its foes with formic acid.As soon as an enemy approaches the ant hill,the insect assumes battle posture,thrusting its abdomen upward between its hind legs.when the invader is 18 centimetres away or closer,the ant squirts it with a stream of formic acid the tip if its abdomen.Small insects are easily killed by the acid defence.
Not all predators,however are so easily deterred.A bear for example,can break up an ant hill and lick up tens of thousands of its inhabitants before the insect even begin to respond to the attack.
