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With their combined weight greater
than the combined weight of all humans, ants are the most numerous type of
animal. Strong in relation to their size, ants can carry 10 to 20 times their
body weight. They work in teams to move extremely heavy things.
The Ant's brain is the largest amongst insects. Mushroom shaped brain appendages
have function similar to the gray-matter of the human brain. It has been
estimated that an ant's brain may have the same processing power as a Macintosh
II computer.
The first thing you will notice in an ant's anatomy is the three main divisions.
The head, the thorax, and the abdomen. Ant bodies, like other insects have an
exoskeleton . Their skeleton is on the outside - not covered by skin, muscles,
and tissue like humans.
The head of an ant has several important parts. First
the eyes. Ant eyes are a lot like flies. They have many small eyes connected
together. This enables ants to see movement very well. Also Attached to the head
of the ant are two feelers.
The feelers are special organs of smell that help
ants communicate. If you have ever seen an ant find a food source, it is not
long before the ant communicates to his friends and their are many ants there.
Ants release pheromones (chemicals that have different smells) to communicate
with each other. The feelers pick up these smells as signals. The head also has
two strong pinchers which are used to carry food, to dig, and to defend. Just
inside the mouth is a small pocket where ants can store food. They can give this
food to other ants in need.
The trunk or thorax of the ant is where all 6 legs are attached. At the end of
each leg is a sharp claw that helps ants climb and hang onto things. The abdomen
of the ant is a poison sack. The abdomen accommodates the crop, stomach,
intestines and poison gland. In winter, the amount of fat is increased and the
abdomen becomes hard
 Ants
are closely related to wasps and other stinging insects. Many types of ants have
stingers and can inflict a very painful sting. This is a useful way to defend
against the many predators ants have.
Ants do not have lungs. Oxygen enters through tiny holes all over the body and
Carbon Dioxide leaves through the same holes. There are no blood vessels. The
heart is a long tube that pumps colorless blood from the head back to the rear
and then back up to the head again. The nervous system of ants consists of a
long nerve cord that also runs from head to rear with branches leading to the
parts of the body, kind of like a human spinal cord.
Ants have a symbiotic relationship with aphids. See an ant milking aphids for
honeydew if there are aphids all over your roses, chances are they are being
protected by ants.
 Ants are a major nuisance and they can be difficult to control. They can enter
your home through the smallest cracks and invade your kitchen and your pantry.
They leave scent trails (pheromones) for other ants to follow once they have
located a food source. So, those 3 or 4 ants on your countertop could quickly
turn into a couple hundred gathering ants in no time. Ant colonies can be found
anywhere in and around your house and it is important to locate the colony for
proper and successful treatment. This is why most do-it-yourself treatments do
not work. They are targeted at eliminating only the ants you see and not the
entire colony. Ant colonies can be made up of hundreds of thousands of ants and
killing just a couple hundred on your countertop will not detour them from
returning, usually in greater numbers.
Finding a a Solution for Ants
In order to find a solution to your ant problems. We first have to discover the
nature of your particular problem. Not all ants are the same. They live in
different places and the colonies come in different sizes.
1) Identifying to the species of ant is the first step to controlling the
problem. There are 11,880 known ant species, but we only have to worry about a
few major structural infesting ants here in Kansas. Check out our pictures in
the pest index of the more common ants you may be facing.
2) Where is the location of the ant colony or usually many locations of the
various ant colonies nesting? Are the ants inside the house or outside the
house? Are they nesting in a gutter on the roof? Are they in the yard up a tree
75 feet away from the structure?
3) What is the possible size of the colony? Everybody thinks of an ant colony as
being this little mound some where in the back yard. An ant colony might be the
size of a silver dollar or as long as a city block.
Haley Pest Control offers Ant Answers in Lawrence, KS and in Topeka, Kansas,
Baldwin, Eudora, Overland Park, Olathe, Lenexa, Leawood, Shawnee Mission,
Stanley, Ottawa, Kansas City, Basehor, Linwood, Tonganoxie, Mclouth, and
Perry-Lecompton. We offer Pest Management and Exterminator services for the
following counties: Douglas, Johnson, Jefferson, Franklin, Shawnee, Wyandotte
and Leavenworth, KS.
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