Do
you know that ants have the capacity to carry objects which are 50 times more
of their body weight? It is an admirable trait considering their tiny size,
right? But ants are not only admired for that aspect, their existence and way
of life as a “community” are oftentimes equate to an ideal society except that
they are not humans. However, they live in a way that cooperation is a natural
behavior that attributes its survival in whatever conditions they are in. To
help us better understand it, we will have a closer look of ants’ life cycle.
The
life of an ant evolves in four cycles – egg, larva, pupa and adult. Their metamorphosis process is almost similar to butterflies and caterpillars.
The
eggs are in oval tiny shape with approximate size of 1mm but the egg of a
doomed queen is significantly bigger in size. Then reaching the stage of larva,
they become like worm but with the absence of eyes and legs. Ant workers will
vomit a certain amount of food to feed the larvae. Also at this phase of ants’ life cycle, larva keeps shedding
skins due to its growing size.
Next
is pupa wherein it will be covered with silk cocoon. This metamorphosis process
turns the pupa into an adult.
The
duration of ants’ life cycle
vary. It can be within few weeks to a year. This is attributed to various
factors such as surroundings, availability of food, temperature and humidity. In
terms of longevity, worker ants can live up to seven years while queen ants
reach up to 15 years.
Ants
akin to the society of human beings have caste system too. The basic classes
are workers, queen and male ants.
Ant
workers are considered as the sterile females and they comprised the biggest
population in their colonies. Generally their scope of work is gathering and
storing food, building tunnels, defending the colonies and taking care of the larvae
which involve feeding, grooming, transporting and protecting. However, this
scope of work differs according to kind of ant species. For instance, some ant
species categorize their worker’s jobs and responsibilities according to their
size while other species divide the jobs and responsibilities according to
their age.
The
queen ants are destined because of their size. Generally they are twice or more
bigger than the size of a worker. Their main role is to reproduce and lay eggs.
Because of this nature, they are responsible too in locating the best nest site.
Like a trait of any mothers regardless of the kind of specie, they also assist
the workers in feeding and grooming the larvae.
Lastly,
there is the male ant. Their main responsibility is to mate the queen and they
die within two weeks after mating the queen. This is only the purpose of their
existence. They do not even take part in any activities within the colonies.
Perhaps
ants’ life cycle is totally
different from the life cycle of human beings but their complex existing way of
life and system has proven to be effective and efficient. They epitomize the
ideal community wherein individuals cooperate with each other and are working
together for the greater good of the group. Indeed it is interesting to learn
how these tiny creatures can live peacefully even they are thousands of
individuals in their colonies.
