The Leafcutter Ant—A Growing Problem in the Southern States

The leafcutter ant is mainly found in Central and South America, but has reached as far north as Oklahoma. Leafcutters carry pieces of leaves, but they do not eat these leaves.

They bring the leaf pieces to the colony and use them to feed a fungus found deep inside the massive group of chambers.

Once inside the colony, other ants cut up the leaves into a slimy mulch and remove any contaminants.

At the same time, they lick the leaves, which removes any protective film on the leaf.

They then treat this fungal food with a special substance the breaks down the leaves' proteins.

Finally, they add fungal hyphae to the leaf paste they've created. As the hyphae grow, they produce gongylidia, which are used to feed the ant larvae and the adult ants in the colony.

Castes of the Colony

The leafcutter ant colony has several castes, most of which consist of females.

The males are drones, whose only function is to mate with the queen. Depending on the size of the colony, there may be 1 to 3 queens. The job of the queen(s) is to lay eggs and start new colonies.

If a queen wants to start a new colony, she takes a patch of hyphae from the garden, finds a drone and mates with him. She looks for a new place to start her colony and starts laying her thousands of eggs.

The castes are:

• Minims, the smallest workers, manage the growing brood or care for the fungus patches. Some will sit on the mediae (below) and protect them from attack by the phorid fly.
• Minors are a little larger minim workers and are present in large numbers. They're the first line of defense, continuously patrolling the surrounding area and attacking any enemies that threaten the colony.
• Mediae are generalized hunters. They cut the leaves and bring the leaf parts back to the nest.
• Majors are the larger worker ants and the soldiers, defending the nest from trespassers, clearing the main foraging trails of large debris and bringing the bulky items back to the nest.

Leafcutter Ant Control

These ants can defoliate crops in very little time, which makes them a pest that needs to be controlled in the southern states. You can deter them by collecting the ants' refuse from their colony and placing it around or over crops.

The phorid fly is the only true enemy of this ant. A parasitic fly, it lays its eggs in crevices in the ants' heads. When the eggs hatch, the larvae feed on the ant.

If you can introduce the Escovopsis fungus into a colony, it could help to kill, or at least damage, the colony.

If this page was valuable for you, please share your new knowledge. Click Like...