Aspies For Freedom

Not long before New Year's day 2008, I spotted these large ants in the trunk of a tree at the Santa Barbara Esplanade, Bowen, North Queensland, Australia. Most were approximately 2 cm long but I saw a couple larger.

WOW Great pic!
I love watching ants...
2cm long is big...we don't usually get ants that in the UK.

<--This guy's got ants in his pants.  

Lolz! These ants were certainly bigger than the usual ones I see around the place eg. meat ants and green ants and the little black sugar ants.

What are those ants called that are "half red, half black"?  What's the deal with that?  Usually a red ant colony attacks a black ant colony--how did they manage to interbreed?  Or perhaps I'm just undereducated on this and should stop asking dumb questions.

We have "meat ants" here that are half dark green and half black. They are about the same size as "carpenter ants/green ants" but dig large tunnels under the ground. When I was younger, I used to like to crumble up biscuits and watch the ants carry the crumbs back into their tunnels. The tunnels had a number of holes that opened onto the surface of the ground and these were surrounded by small piles of kicked-up dirt.

I can't see too clearly, but from the size of them, could be bulldog ants, big, mean sons of bitches with jaws that cross over like a pair of misaligned scissors, potent venom and bad temper.

Some of those aussie ants are pretty nasty.

I certainly wasn't game to touch any of those ants in case they were "bitey".

And Ants are Commies don'tcha know ;p

Queen my arse, more like an Egg Machine lol.

Actually, the tree does look a bit like a bum, with ants running out.

Way to lower the intellectual tone of the conversation hun

hehe

LOL pakrat, it does look kinda like a builder's arse now I think about it  (boy do I wish I hadn't thought about that actually, I have just eaten)

Reminds me of the time I sat on an ants nest when I was just a kitten, I had been out to I think delamere forest, mushroom hunting, I can only have been 6-7 at the time, and apparently was going absolutely berserk on the way back in the car, not knowing what was wrong, until I got back, and realised there were very angry red ants sharpening their stingers in my tender young arse.

That was a moment I won't soon forget.

At least we don't have jumper ants and bulldog ants here, and red ant stings don't kill, just drive poor little autie kittens up the walls going down motorways

The photo is of a mossy butt crack.

Haha, I was thinking it kind of looked like ants crawling on someone's ass as well. It made me chuckle - thanks for posting it. They look a bit like carpenter ants (Camponotus spp.) to me as well. There are quite a few species in Australia, and they are considered to be harmless because they can't sting or inflict painful bites.

Here's a picture of a carpenter ant princess I rescued from some water last week. It looks very similar to the ants in your photo.

I rescued some hairy caterpillars from the footpath under a gum tree and hope they missed getting stepped on by pedestrians.

Awesome... I try to rescue insects from walkways as well.

When I was in middle school I used to yell at immature boys who intentionally stepped on caterpillars on the ground.