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Sticker of American carpenter ant
Bug card No. 0071 of 4,939

American carpenter ant

Camponotus americanus
Eats: A bit of everythingAntsForests and woods6 legs

The American carpenter ant is a big ant. Its workers are bigger than most ants you see. It usually builds its home in the soil, but it can also move into rotten logs.

Lives in
North America, in soil, under stones and in rotten logs
Length
0.7 to 1 cm (0.28 to 0.39 in)
workers
Top speed
about 0.42 km/h (0.26 mph)
On foot, estimate
What does it eat?
Like other carpenter ants, it eats sweet juices and small insects.
For real!Photo of American carpenter ant
Picture by April Nobile. CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

How big is it?

How long is it?

American carpenter ant about 1 cm long (0.39 in)A grain of rice about 6 mm (0.24 in)A toy building brick about 3.2 cm (1.3 in)
small enough to sit on your fingernailas long as 1.5 grains of rice in a rowcould run across a dinner table in 8.6 seconds

How big is American carpenter ant compared to YOU?

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How fast is it?

cool stuff

Fun facts

1

Its workers are 7 to 10 millimetres long, which is big for an ant.

2

It usually nests in the soil, but it may also live under stones, under fallen leaves or in rotten logs.

3

Carpenter ants got their name because many of them make their homes in wood.

you asked

Most asked questions about American carpenter ant

?Where does the American carpenter ant live?

Mostly in the soil, and sometimes under stones or in rotten logs.

For bug experts

Scientific name
Camponotus americanus
Group
Ants
Family
Formicidae
Classification
Insecta > Hymenoptera > Formicidae
Lives on
North America

Where the facts come from

  1. Camponotus americanus (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
  2. Picture by April Nobile. 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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More from the same group: Ants

Also at home here: Forests and woods

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