Talk:Argentine ant

Don't co-exist with Fire ants

Information from the article is different from what is written in one of the links. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/09/15/BAG75L6BJK1.DTL&type=science mentions that fire ants don't co-exist with argentine ants. "Quickly spreading north and west, they attacked other ants and established dominance everywhere -- except in the southern states, where more aggressive fire ants have kept them at bay." 80.178.110.82 21:24, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

This a late response, but the article looks good. Argentine ants will not attack other Argentine ant nests, but will attack nests of other ant species. HairyWombat (talk) 04:15, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Argentine ants will attack other Argentine ants; but only in their native range. These ants form super colonies and won’t attack members within supercolonies , but will attack Argentine ants from a different supercolony (super colonies are big, but an Argentine ant from Northern California would fight one Argentine ants in Southern California) Unknownparty (talk) 10:10, 9 March 2023 (UTC)

Alert to all animal owners

Argentine ants KILL.

I live in Queensland, Australia I dont know if these ants are as agresive in other parts of the world but I think this will be very good info for people...

I went out to check on my Guinea Pigs and foud SIX of them to be dead they were coverd with these ants and their fur was eaten off by the ants I have tried every thing to stop these ants but they DO NOT respond to any thing I use or do. I f you have small animals Eg. Guinea Pigs, Rats, Rabits, Mice ECT. and you notice you have a lot of these ants around I Very Stronglky Urge you to bring them into safty like a garage or even inside. I hope that this message stops the deaths of little animals and helps you in some way. :) . I dont want people to go thru what I did.

This Message was posted by Sam. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Poooochi (talk • contribs) 07:11, 27 December 2006 (UTC).

(moved here from article —Quicksilver^{T @} 11:57, 27 December 2006 (UTC))

what makes you think it was the ants that killed your guinea pigs and not another creature that left the carcass to the ants? i have heard they arent afraid of attacking bigger creatures, though. 80.178.110.82 21:26, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Haha, the Argentine ants don't kill animals, your guinea pigs be dead, and later the ants take a nice lunch, but really, don't kill animals152.170.24.22 (talk) 23:00, 2 August 2016 (UTC)A Argentine

Common names

If you know other names these ants are called by, please add them to the article. I used to collect such names in my search for their "real" name, but never kept a list. Thmazing (talk) 02:44, 29 June 2008 (UTC)

In Argentina we call this ants as: Hormiga Colorada--152.170.24.22 (talk) 23:05, 2 August 2016 (UTC)

Homemade bait = not enough borax?

I think the Recipe needs to be adjusted to include more than a 1/4 Teaspoon of Borax. Because I tried the homemade bait on an Argentine Ant Trail and the ants disappeared within 3 days. But some days later, the Ants reappeared again. I'm thinking that I didn't use enough Borax in the Recipe and was wondering if using a higher dose of Borax in the recipe might cause the Bait to work more effectively or be refused by the ants. --Arima (talk) 23:26, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

REPLY: The Morgan Hill Times article is no longer available, so the mixture cannot be verified. But, in Wikipedia's footnote is the following: "The original formula called for 4 teaspoons boric acid powder, 3 cups of water and 1 cup of granulated sugar." —Preceding unsigned comment added by Floydbeck (talk • contribs) 14:06, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

See the Pharaoh ant article where a formula is still available. Also see the Talk page for that article. HairyWombat (talk) 04:03, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

A simple mixture of five parts sugar to one part borax laundry soap (such as 20 Mule Team Borax brand commonly available) will kill the ant colony in about three days. Add just enough water to make the mixture a thick sloppy syrup, and mix well. If you put it out and the water dries up, simply add a little more water and re-stir. Mamarazzi (talk) 07:35, 1 September 2013 (UTC)

The recipe in the Pharaoh ant article is different than the one published in the Morgan Hill Times and formerly included in the Argentine ant article: It consists of liver and boric acid, instead of water, sugar and boric acid. — Quicksilver^{T @} 07:11, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

The homebrew boric acid and sugar recipe works fine. I'm the one who originally found the article ("Controlling Pesky Ants", by Keith Muraoka, in the Friday, December 27, 2002 edition of the Morgan Hill Times) and included the information in the article until some pedantic deletionist removed it (perhaps on the payroll of certain pesticide manufacturers?); I have eradicated nests of Argentine ants repeatedly using the recipe, and others have had similar results, if you bother to perform an Internet search. The ratio of the ingredients is what matters, not the quantity. If you scale the Morgan Hill Times quantities mentioned by Floydbeck down from 3 cups of liquid to 1.5 fluid ounces, you'll find the proportions are about the same. Since it was removed from the article, here it is again for reference: 3 tablespoons (1.5 fl. oz.) hot deionized or distilled water, 1 tablespoon sugar, 1/4 teaspoon boric acid powder. This forms a super-saturated solution that is prone to thicken and crystallize within a few weeks, so there is little point in mixing larger quantities, and a fresh batch should be prepared for each invasion. I had a large invasion of L. humile in my house several years ago, requiring refilling of the bait stations every day or two for over two weeks until the ants stopped coming. I haven't seen an Argentine ant in or around my house going on four years now. I'm assuming that this was a cooperative invasion launched by ants from multiple nests in the neighborhood, and that's why it involved such a huge number of them, lasting so long. Prior to that I had dealt with smaller invasions from individual nests using the herein described recipe and the ants always stopped coming after 3 to 4 days of feeding at the bait dishes, with several months of respite between incursions. — Quicksilver^{T @} 06:46, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Summertime behavior

I'd like to make a note that Argentine Ants are not very active during a scorching day of bright sunlight and clear weather and as a result will try to make use of any shade that they can find. As a result, established trails that are completely exposed to the sunlight, without any fallen leaves, plants, rocks, or any tall or covering objects to provide shade, will become disused until sunset or cloudy weather comes around.

I've also noticed on my front lawn that they make use of weeds as hiding grounds and trail markers because of the adequate shade they provide. --Arima (talk) 21:51, 5 July 2009 (UTC)

I'd like to add that the behavior of Argentine ants will vary depending on the environment they are in. In Southern California, where it is warm most of the year and relatively dry, the nests are almost always located outside of homes. They will trail into homes in search of food but will bring the bounty back to their outside nests. By comparison, when I lived in Crescent City, California, their behavior was extraordinarily different. Probably due to the colder and wetter weather, the ants prefer to nest inside of homes, and often inside electrical appliances. Their trails are much smaller and slower moving (by comparison) so it was also difficult to follow a trail back to the nest. ZincOrbie (talk) 18:17, 23 October 2009 (UTC)

It is interesting that you mention electrical appliances, as I experienced a failure of a split refrigeration system about 30 years ago wherein hundreds of Argentine ants had crawled into the relay box of the outdoor condenser unit and many had been fried between the power relay points. Once contaminated by several ant carcasses, the poor contact caused arcing, destroying the points and requiring replacement of the relay. There was no food or water source in the relay box, so the reason for the ants to crawl in there had to be something else, perhaps being attracted to the electric fields around the points. If suitable references could be found, this information might make an interesting addition to the article. — Quicksilver^{T @} 06:46, 10 January 2016 (UTC. In the summer they tend to rely on people for their food and water.

Aphids

I had to restructure the mention of aphids so it reads like this:

Argentine ants sometimes tend aphid colonies[1], and their protection of this plant pest can ccause problems in agricultural areas by protecting plant pests from predators and parasitoids.

...which is a little awkwarder than it read before, but I needed to make clear that the reference I located only verifies that Argentine ants sometimes tend aphid colonies–it doesn't verify anything else in the sentence. If the rest is confirmed feel free to reword, but otherwise please make sure the veracity of the reference is sustained. --Xiaphias (talk) 18:15, 16 April 2010 (UTC)

Importance rating

Considering that this species is listed as one of the worst invasive species by the IUCN and how wide spread the species is, I would think that it should rate a little higher than 'low importance' on the scale. Funkyj (talk) 17:22, 16 July 2010 (UTC)

Indeed, I've changed it to high. Smartse (talk) 11:27, 17 July 2010 (UTC)

Pictures for this article

I don't know how many pictures this article should have, but the ones that it does have are pretty wimpy considering how important and common these ants are. I have some pictures I took in Northern California of Argentine Ants doing various things - eating, carrying dead of their own kind, and consuming dead cockroaches, as well as some moderately good closeups of individual workers. If anybody could let me know if there is a need for these here, it would be helpful. But I've never uploaded images to Wikipedia before, so I might need some help. Zibem (talk) 05:32, 30 March 2011 (UTC)

That sounds great. I agree that the article could use some more pictures. Go ahead and upload everything you have to Wikimedia Commons, even if some won't end up in this article. I'll help you if you need it. —Keenan Pepper 01:24, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

"Single supercolony"?

I am a novice on this subject, I'll admit, but I have just finished reading a book on entomology that clearly and repeatedly emphasized ongoing warfare between Argentine ants of four separate supercolonies in California alone- two of which were identified as the "Lake Hodges Colony" and "Very Large Colony". If anyone knows the truth behind this situation, feel free to correct the article (or me). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.169.11.177 (talk) 20:02, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

An extensive article on the topic can be found here: https://doi.org/10.1093/beheco/ars043. I'm trying to digest it.

Pgramsey (talk) 04:42, 25 August 2020 (UTC)

Now in Canada

A report of this ant was just in my local newspaper. Apparently the ant is now in Victoria BC. Canada. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.69.101.107 (talk) 16:28, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

Dug up the source:

• Smart, Amy (21 July 2013). "Tiny Argentine ants invade Victoria, poised to bug you like crazy". Times Colonist. Victoria is the only known Canadian location of the ant, which has been identified on every continent except Antarctica.

71.41.210.146 (talk) 17:09, 22 August 2016 (UTC)

Suggestions

The Argentine Ant (Linepithema humile) is a common invasive ant in people’s homes and in nature although it is native to parts of South America in lowland areas. The article introduces a very interesting theory about the global super colony that has been formed by these invasive ants. The article emphasized that it is dietary factors that affect recognition cues for ants and dictate how they interact. The article had strong points about the ant interactions and the differences between native and invasive species. The article lacked a section about Taxonomy/Phylogeny, which would have been very helpful to understand how these super colonies came to be. Additionally, we learn nothing about the hierarchy within a colony other than that the worker bees are sterile but they are able to direct egg development. A section about behavior based on climate for native ants would have been helpful to understand the differences between pest and native ants. This article is rated as C-class but of high importance because of the pestiness of these ants. Most of the critiques were centered on the validity of the information and questioning the idea of the super colony, which I agree could be improved. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Claire.packer (talk • contribs) 15:53, 10 September 2015 (UTC)

It's not likely that there's a "global" supercolony, but quite possible that there's a North American supercolony, as it is presumed that the ants got to North America as stowaways on a shipment of goods sometime in the late 1800s or early 1900s. That would make their descendants on the continent genetically closely related, perhaps identical, so that individuals could move from nest to nest without being identified as strangers, attacked and killed. — Quicksilver^{T @} 06:46, 10 January 2016 (UTC)

Japan location

I would just like to point out that Kobe is not on the "west coast of Japan" but is rather on the "coast of Western Japan". This may seem a small difference but Kobe is not on a western coastline, it is on the coast of Osaka Bay, on the Pacific Coast of Japan.

I am not knowledgeable about ants so I don't wish to edit the article but the next time someone updates the range information perhaps this could be incorporated.— Preceding unsigned comment added by GummyYeti (talk • contribs) 15:51, October 4, 2015‎ (UTC)

The BBC source says "A third huge colony exists on the west coast of Japan." and "the super-colony in west Japan, as well as another in Kobe, Japan." The author is distinguishing the Kobe infestation from the west-coast one. So I have not made this change. 71.41.210.146 (talk) 17:27, 12 August 2016 (UTC)

Assessment comment

The comment(s) below were originally left at Talk:Argentine ant/Comments, and are posted here for posterity. Following several discussions in past years, these subpages are now deprecated. The comments may be irrelevant or outdated; if so, please feel free to remove this section.

The statement regarding the Argentine ants (Linepithema humile) attraction to electrical fields cannot be attributed to this species. This behavior is attributed to the red imported fire ant (Solenopsis invicta), or simply RIFA. The statement regarding loss of genetic diversity to explain mega colonization and diverse colony cooperation was found to be false by a Stanford University study. West coast colonies had exhibited a suppressed fight response with like species but this was attributed to fight response gene suppression not lack of genetic diversity. One should note that within the study area (on campus grounds) there were colonies that did not cooperate with like species. South and East coast colonies were found to have a much higher fight response amongst each other than West coast colonies probably due to multiple introductions of the Argentine ant.

Last edited at 00:28, 8 May 2007 (UTC). Substituted at 03:07, 3 May 2016 (UTC)

Size?

In the "Description" section, the two references give conflicting size ranges for the workers. (Is there a better inline template than {{dubious}} specifically for conflicting sources?)

• "Argentine ants". Orkin. Retrieved December 2015. Argentine ants range from light to dark brown and measure about 2.2 to 2.8 mm long. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help)
• Eric P. Benson; Patricia A. Zungoli; Jennifer S. Nauman. "Argentine Ants". Clemson University, College of Agriculture, Forestry and Life Science. The workers which are all female are about 1/16" long and they are monomorphic, meaning they are all similar in size.

1/16" = 1.6 mm, so that's a pretty significant discrepancy. Additional sources would be very useful. 71.41.210.146 (talk) 03:20, 22 August 2016 (UTC)

• A third data point is File:Argentine Ant (Linepithema Humile).jpeg, which is described as "large" and measures "2.186 mm". This conflicts with both of the above! 71.41.210.146 (talk) 18:33, 4 October 2016 (UTC)
• GISD, the Global Invasive Species Database managed by the Invasive Species Specialist Group (ISSG) of the IUCN Species Survival Commission, quotes PaDIL, the Pests and Diseases Image Library (PaDIL), an initiative of the Australian Government’s Department of Agriculture, in collaboration with Museum Victoria, Plant Health Australia, the Department of Agriculture and Food Western Australia and the Plant Biosecurity Cooperative Research Centre. They write, "The workers of this species are small, medium to dark brown ants, reaching 2 to 3 mm in length."  --Lambiam 09:36, 6 June 2020 (UTC)

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Range Map?

Since one of the most notable things about Argentine ants is how invasive they are, one idea that strikes me (which would also help address the previously mentioned concerns about needing more pictures) would be the addition of a map of the Argentine ant's range to the article. I notice that, although the article does mention its native range, several of the countries and continents it has "invaded", and the locations of a few of the largest (and most notable) supercolonies, the article does not actually specify all of the locations where the Argentine ant has been found. For example, something like the one in Africanized_bee. I'd do it myself, but I'm a busy college student who unfortunately lacks the time. Floyd661 (talk) 01:48, 24 April 2019 (UTC)

Diatomaceous earth

"A non-toxic way to eradicate these ants is by dusting the trails, feeding sites and nest entrances with diatomaceous earth, if the problem is inside the home use food grade earth." is unsourced and assumes that diatomaceous earth has no drawbacks. Like borax, it can be a respiratory irritant. —PaleoNeonate – 06:11, 26 August 2020 (UTC)

I don't think the safety drawbacks should affect it's inclusion in the article, applications such as within wall spaces seem fairly useful since it does not degrade when dry. It would be nice to have a actual study though since it's effectiveness varies between insect and ant species, I found many brief references and it seems to be widely used for this ant, but nothing particularly authoritative confirming it's effectiveness on this particular ant. The ubiquity would appear to support it but it may still be best to leave the description as "it is used" rather than "it is effective". MasterTriangle12 (talk) 14:24, 26 August 2020 (UTC)

Yes since it's popular, I left it, abeit unsourced, and removed the "non-toxic" claim. —PaleoNeonate – 23:53, 26 August 2020 (UTC)