Wood Ants

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This is a group of Holarctic Formica species. They form large polydomous colonies and have conspicuous thatch nests. During the warmer months of the year these ants are very active tending arboreal aphids. The size of their nests, the high level of activity of their large workers, the conspiciouos nest mounds and the large number of forest insects they gather from the trees as part of their aphid milking activities have all played a role in wood ants being the subject of research studies over many, many decades. This body of work is largely focused on Palearctic species although there has been some significant studies done with North American wood ants.

Parmentier et al. (2018) - These widespread ants are keystone arthropods in European forest ecosystems (Gösswald 1989; Stockan and Robinson 2016). They exert wide-range effects on the forest fauna and flora and drive biogeochemical processes (Wardle et al. 2011). The above ground part of a red wood ant nest is a conspicuous mound of organic thatch (Rosengren et al. 1987), which is tightly regulated and provides an ideal habitat for a diverse community of associated symbionts, known as myrmecophiles (Parmentier et al. 2014). The majority of these red wood ant myrmecophiles directly interact with their host by feeding on their eggs and larvae and stealing prey carried into the nest (Parmentier et al. 2016a).

Nearctic

 * Formica calviceps
 * Formica ciliata
 * Formica coloradensis
 * Formica comata
 * Formica criniventris
 * Formica ferocula
 * Formica fossaceps
 * Formica integra
 * Formica integroides
 * Formica laeviceps
 * Formica mucescens
 * Formica obscuripes
 * Formica obscuriventris
 * Formica oreas
 * Formica planipilis
 * Formica prociliata
 * Formica propinqua
 * Formica ravida
 * Formica subnitens

Paelarctic

 * Formica aquilonia
 * Formica dusmeti
 * Formica frontalis
 * Formica lugubris
 * Formica opaca
 * Formica paralugubris
 * Formica polyctena
 * Formica pratensis
 * Formica rufa
 * Formica sinensis
 * Formica truncorum
 * Formica uralensis
 * Formica yessensis