| Ant milking Aphids for honeydew
Aphids are an extremely common pest in your garden, scrubs and other
plant life. They suck the sap from plants leading to the drying,
discoloration, and eventually the death of the plant. Aphids will also
transmit diseases through their saliva from plant to plant. The plants sap is
digested by the Aphids and excreted as a sweet-sticky liquid called honeydew.
Ants feed on this honeydew.
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Most Ant species do not cause much damage to plants; however they do
protect the Aphids from predators in order to harvest the honeydew. The
harvesting of the dew is called "milking" the aphids, which the ants
accomplish by stroking the abdomen of the Aphid to stimulate the release of the
liquid. The Ants will even save the eggs of these insects over winter in order
to bring them out during the spring. Aphids are to Ants what cows are the
Humans.
