Ant Nests: Ants Love City Living

Ant nests are everywhere: inside plants, hollow logs, dead trees. Ants that tunnel in wood can chew out sizable rooms for themselves. It can be a mighty problem for people when ants invade the timber of houses, causing the wood to collapse. Other house-loving ants can cause problems, too, by nesting in between walls. In the tropics, some ant species suspend earthen or silken nests from tree branches.

Ant nests come in all sizes. Some nests may have as few as a dozen ants nesting in one chamber underground, while other nests may have millions of ants inhabiting many tunnel-connected chambers. One tropical species built a nest that extended 40 feet (12 meters) below the ground. The nesting site of yet another species covered an area the size of a tennis court.

It's fascinating to watch ants build nests. Ants know that the ideal time to construct a nest in the ground is after a rain. The damp soil is easier to work with. After removing pellets of soil from the nest site, the ants mold them into a brick-like form. These little bricks are used to construct the chamber walls and ceilings of the nest.

Do you know what the ants use the chambers for? Young ants live in some of the rooms. Some rooms are used for the storage of ant eggs. There are rooms for storing food. Tired ants have rooms for resting. There are even rooms for socializing!

When it's cold, the ant colony moves down to the deepest rooms of the nest where it is warmer. Do you know why it is common to find ants under a stone? Probably because the stone protects the exit of their underground nest. Also, stones become hot under the afternoon sun and remain warm during the night. This warmth will radiate down into the nest and keep the young ants comfortable.

Some ant species conceal the entrance or exit of their nest in grass or leaves. It is not unusual for ants to close the nest with small pebbles. Some ants dump excavated soil or sand near the nest entrance, creating a small ant-hill. If the ant-hill washes away, the ants will dump some more in the same spot. Most ant-watchers are familiar with this mark of a nest entrance.