Woodland red ant
Myrmica ruginodis
The woodland red ant is a small reddish ant of the cool north. It likes woods and moorland, even high up in the mountains. One nest can have up to 20 queens and about 2,500 ants.
Lives in
Northern Europe and Asia, from Western Europe to Japan, in woods and moorland
What does it eat?
It mostly eats small insects and other little creatures. Sometimes it also nibbles on dead birds or mice it finds.
How fast is it?
A garden snail about 0.05 km/h (0.03 mph)
A tortoise about 0.3 km/h (0.19 mph)
Woodland red ant about 0.3 km/h (0.19 mph)
A person walking about 5 km/h (3.1 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
It is the only ant that lives on the Shetland Islands in Scotland.
2
It has been found in every corner of the British Isles, more than any other ant.
3
Its babies spend the winter as larvae, and only after winter can some of them grow into queens.
4
The new queens and males fly out to find mates in July and August.
you asked
Most asked questions about Woodland red ant
?How many queens does a woodland red ant nest have?
Often 10 to 20 queens live together in one nest.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Myrmica ruginodis
- Named by
- Nylander, 1846
- Group
- Ants
- Family
- Formicidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Hymenoptera > Formicidae
- Lives on
- Europe, Asia
Where the facts come from
- Myrmica ruginodis (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 April Nobile. CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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