Common red ant
The common red ant is a small red ant that lives under stones, fallen trees and in the soil. It is brave and would rather fight than run away.
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Fun facts
One nest can have up to a hundred queens.
A queen can live up to fifteen years.
In late summer, hundreds of young queens and males fly up into the air together to find a partner.
When an ant in the nest dies, other ants carry the body up to 3 metres away from the nest.
The caterpillars of some blue butterflies, like the Alcon blue, sneak into its nest and are raised by the ants.
Most asked questions about Common red ant
?What do red ants eat?
Sweet honeydew from aphids, small insects and other little animals, and sometimes pollen.
?How big is the common red ant?
A worker is only about 3.5 to 5.5 millimetres long.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Myrmica rubra
- Group
- Ants
- Family
- Formicidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Hymenoptera > Formicidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Asia, North America
- Also known as
- European fire ant
Where the facts come from
- Myrmica rubra (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by AntWeb.org. CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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