Common Ants - Falls Creek Animal & Pest Control

Common Minnesota Ants

They crawl over the rocks by the dock. They pile up sand on the sidewalk. They scurry across the kitchen

floor. City or country, outdoors or in. Some of these amazing insects are hunters. Some are harvesters.

Some farm fungi. Some keep slaves. Others keep caterpillars or aphids. Minnesota has more than 100

ant species. Most kinds of ants make their homes in tunnels in the soil or in wood. They live and work

together in communities made up of hundreds or thousands of individuals, almost all of them sisters.

Ants are social insects. That means they live in colonies and share the work of building a nest and

feeding and caring for the eggs and young.

Lasius neoniger, the turfgrass ant, is one of the most common ants in the eastern United States. It builds nests underground on lawns and along the side of the road, leaving a donut-sized anthill at the entrance. Queens and males emerge for their mating flight in late summer, often in swarms after a rain. Turfgrass ants eat dead insects and plant nectar, and also tend root aphids, much as a farmer tends cows. In winter the ants store and care for aphid eggs in their nest. In spring they carry the newly hatched aphids to nearby plant roots to feed. As the aphids feed, they secrete a sweet substance, called honeydew, which the ants harvest and eat.

Tetramorium caespitum, If you see ants on the sidewalk, there's a good chance they are Tetramorium caespitum, or pavement ants. This ant was brought to North America from Europe. The workers are about as big as this letter t. The queen is more than twice as big. Some pavement ants bring butterfly caterpillars into their nest. The ants guard the caterpillars from predators. When the caterpillars feed, they secrete a juicy substance that the ants eat. Pavement ants are famous for getting into ant fights between colonies.

Solenopsis molesta is a tiny, yellowish ant that lives in the ground or in rotting wood. Members of this species are often called thief ants because they steal eggs and larvae from other kinds of ants, then eat them. If thief ants get into your house, they will try to steal your food instead. Though they will eat sugary treats, they like greasy food such as meat and cheese even better. In fact, some people call them grease ants. Because thief ants are so small -- some smaller than this letter o -- it's easy for them to squeeze into packaged food and other tiny places.

Camponotus pennsylvanicus, the carpenter ant, makes tunnels in wood for its nests. But carpenter ants don't eat wood. Instead, they eat plant juices, honeydew, other insects, and dead animals. Carpenter ant larvae have tiny hairs that make them stick together like Velcro. That makes it easy for workers to move them in bunches from chamber to chamber in the nest. Carpenter ants are mainly active at night. They are a favorite food of pileated woodpeckers.