The Complexes of Pheromone Communication in Ants

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    In any successful society, communication is crucial. This is as true for human societies as it is for those in the family Formicidae (ants). Ants have surprisingly nuanced communication skills despite their inability to speak. While we communicate through touch, gestures, and sounds, ants use pheromones in addition to those methods to communicate with those in their colony. This, of course, is due to the eusocial nature of ants which require advanced communication to function properly.

            How does this work? Well, when an ant needs to signal the colony, it secretes a pheromone. Other ants in vicinity can pick up this signal using chemoreceptors in their antennae. This signal invokes a programmed response the ant must perform. Pheromones can produce a wide variety of responses in ants like, display rank, mark trails, and raise an alarm (Lugmayer 2016). These all ensure order within ant colonies

            Marking trails is the job of worker ants who begin secreting a pheromone after they discover a resource (usually building materials or food). They then travel back to the hive leaving the trail behind them, he intensity of pheromone is directly proportional to the number of resources discovered. Other workers will then pick up the pheromone trail follow it to the resources and then leave behind their trails back to colony. This cycle continues until all resources have been exploited, at which point the returning ants stop producing trail pheromone allowing the trail to go cold. This prevents ants from following dead trails while also prioritizing resource dense locations (Jackson 2006).

                                            Image from:https://schoolofbugs.com/why-do-dead-ants-attract-more-ants-everything-you-need-to-know/

            Some of you may have heard that when you kill an ant more will come. Well as it turns out this is true; in the presence of a perceived threat or death an alarm pheromone is released. Now this in itself is not enough to warrant an attack from nearby ants, but it does cause them to approach the site of the release to investigate (Foster 2022).  If danger is present in the area, then the ants have two options. Option one is to wait for the threat(s) to leave so that the body of the dead/releasing ant can be retrieved (Foster 2022). The other option is to initiate attack behavior, which is usually done in the presence of rival ant hive but can be the first course of action in more aggressive species (Foster 2022). This behavior will summon ants to swarm the perceived threat. The attack behavior is not exclusively chemical in nature but requires different stimuli before activation. For example, in carpenter ants (C. obscuripes) it requires olfactory, visual, or tactile stimuli before engaging (Mizunami 2010). At the opposite end of the spectrum, is the fire ant (genus Solenopsis) which will engage in attack behavior at much larger organisms who dare step in their territory (Foster 2022).

 Image from:https://schoolofbugs.com/why-do-dead-ants-attract-more-ants-everything-you-need-to-know/

            I have gone over some of the important functions of pheromone-based communication, now let’s get into how some organisms exploit them. First off, there are eavesdroppers. These organisms can detect the pheromone signals released by ants and use those the prey upon them. The predators do not necessarily need to understand what the ants are communicating but use the chemical signals to track the ants and attack them (Adams 2020). Other pheromone exploiters use recognition pheromones, which ants use to tell nestmates from intruders, to sneak into colonies and prey on unsuspecting victims (Adams 2020).

            Ants have interesting and varied pheromone-based communication system important to their eusocial nature. It allows them to leave effective trails for foraging and alerts them to potential threats. Though it is not without its flaws it provides effective communication not just between individuals but throughout their colonies.

Bibliography

Lugmayer, D. (2016, February 17). Understanding Chemical Communication in Ant Societies. Science Node. Retrieved May 26, 2022, from https://sciencenode.org/feature/understanding-chemical-communication-in-ant-societies.php#:~:text=Ants%20use%20pheromones%20in%20a,these%20pheromones%20and%20respond%20accordingly

 

Jackson, D. E., & Ratnieks, F. L. W. (2006). Communication in ants. Current Biology, 16(15). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2006.07.015

 

Mizunami, M., Yamagata, N., & Nishino, H. (2010, June 8). Alarm pheromone processing in the ant brain: An evolutionary perspective. Frontiers. Retrieved May 26, 2022, from https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnbeh.2010.00028/full

 

Foster, S. (2022, May 24). Why do dead ants attract more ants? everything you need to know. School Of Bugs. Retrieved May 26, 2022, from https://schoolofbugs.com/why-do-dead-ants-attract-more-ants-everything-you-need-to-know/

 

Adams, R. M. M., Wells, R. L., Yanoviak, S. P., Frost, C. J., & Fox, E. G. P. (2020, March 13). Interspecific eavesdropping on ant chemical communication. Frontiers. Retrieved May 26, 2022, from https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fevo.2020.00024/full

 

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