Much more interesting ant links to websites, forums, photographs and weblogs you can find on the links section of this website.

• Myrmecos.net Photo’s at Formicinae
• Punck.net Photo of recording the sound of wood ants
• Limburgs Landschap Accessing nature resorts in Limburg
• Floriade venlo 2012 Continuing the monitoring of the super colony
• Staatsbosbeheer Accessing resorts in Limburg, Brabant and Drenthe 

Ants in other languages

About 12571 species of these amazing insects are living on our planet. Scientists believe that there are so many ants that their total weight could be 15 to 25% of the total animal biomass on earth. That is amazing, especially when you know that the number of ant species is negligible in comparison to the 30 and 50 millions animal  species based on Terry Erwin’s (1988, 1997) study of tropical insects. More about the ant taxonomy on the ant species page. On this website you find an educational section  ‘amazing ant facts‘ were you can discover more about ants.

• Study of tropical insects, Terry Erwin, 1988, 1997
• Hymenoptera Name Server, Ohio State University

Behavior

Ants are social insects. They communicate and cooperate to survive. Ants can communicate in different ways: pheromones, sounds and body language.

Anatomy

Ants are like wasps and bees part of  the Hymenoptera order. Hymenoptera have membranous wings and like other insects they have a head, thorax and abdomen with six legs. More on (simplified) anatomy of ants can be found on the anatomy pages. With their six legs they even leave trails!

• Ant anatomy, University of Florida

Biogeography

Ant can be found almost everywere all over the world. There is only one continent that is not populated by ants: Antarctica. Many ant species can be found on multiple continents like the Argentine ants (Linepithema humile). But there also species only to be found on specific places in the United States like the Leptothorax minutissimus. On a smaller scale ants species prefer specific habitats. By example; European wood ants prefer mainly woods and heatlands.

The smallest study for biogeography of ants would be biotopography. Basically this is the study of the position of nests, roads and functions inside ant’s (super) colonies. Compare it with the studies of  human urban planning. Read more on the Ant-maps project study of wood ants.

• How to Identify the Argentine Ant, Alex Wild, 2008
• Red list, International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, 1996
• Do ants understand the basic principles of urban planning? Arjan van den Bosch, 2008

Evolution

The oldest ant fossil is discovered in Amber. This ant is 92 million years old and discovered in New Jersey. This ant (Brownimecia clavata) already had the same anatomy as modern ants. Just like sharks and crocodiles their survival strategy is very good. They all stand for millions of years and even survived the dinosaurs.

• Primitive new ants in Cretaceous amber from Myanmar, New Jersey, and Canada, Engel, Michael S. and Grimaldi, David A., 2005

Relation to human

Because ants have a social live structure wich is similar to the human social life these insects are an inspiration and subject of study for many people. On this website you can find several ant to human relations revealed.

• Forensic entomology Can ants help solve crimes?
• Ants and volcanoes Can ants predict a volcanic eruption?

Welcome on ant-maps.com

Ant-maps is an Internet site concerning ants and maps. Ants are social insects. They live together in their nest and coöperate to the existence of their colony. Centrally in ant-colonies are one or more queens. They are looked after and are protected by the worker-ants. Once per year new queens and winged males fly out. This is called the mating flight. The fertilised queens found new colonies afterwards. The nests or colonies of woodants are good examples of such colonies.

In the Netherlands come several species of wood ants are protected. The bald red bunch ant (Formica polyctena) and the hairy red wood ant (Formica rufa). They build large nests or domes,  sometimes more than one meter high. In these nests 30,000 ants and several queens live together. The wood-ant project, which presented on this web site, aims at maps of these anthills. Generally in the woods, but sometimes also in the city or along the way.

The colonies of woodants are often recognizable domes of needles in the woods. But what is amazing is that the ants move from one nest to another one. For example to obtain or bring food. The different woodant species do even cooperate this way. A group of nests that is connected with ant roads is called  a super colony. This wood ant rpoject focuses to these super colonies and compares them. The Largest in the database is 30 hectares large, smaller ones only a few hectare. Of the most beautiful super colonies in the surroundings of Venlo you’ll find  in the Floriade. No wonder that there so much attention to the protection of this super colony. And fortunately successfully!

More information on ants in general and the project:

• Simplyfied list of research sites and nests with basic data and photo’s.
• Basic information on ants and amazing ant-acts.
• Floriade 2012 Venlo, the protection of this endangered supercolony.