Little yellow ant
The little yellow ant is a tiny yellow ant with a round head. It first came from Madagascar, but it has travelled on ships to many places around the world. It is so small that you need sharp eyes to see it.
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Fun facts
It is only about 1.6 millimetres long, smaller than a grain of rice.
It guards aphids and other sap-sucking bugs from enemies, and even raises their babies in its nest.
Its colonies can have thousands of queens and grow into huge supercolonies.
In Europe it lives in greenhouses, where it is warm all year.
It reached Florida in 2017, probably by ship.
Most asked questions about Little yellow ant
?How big is the little yellow ant?
It is only about 1.6 millimetres long.
?Why do farmers dislike the little yellow ant?
Because it protects aphids and other bugs that harm crops like oranges and lemons.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Plagiolepis alluaudi
- Group
- Ants
- Family
- Formicidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Hymenoptera > Formicidae
- Lives on
- Africa, Europe, Australia and Oceania, North America
- Also known as
- Alluaud's little yellow ant
Where the facts come from
- Plagiolepis alluaudi (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 Erin Prado. CC BY 4.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this 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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