Atta cephalotes

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Atta cephalotes
Atta cephalotes worker carrying leaf segment
Scientific classification Edit this classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Formicidae
Subfamily: Myrmicinae
Genus: Atta
Species:
A. cephalotes
Binomial name
Atta cephalotes
Synonyms
  • Atta cephalotes integrior Forel, 1904
  • Atta cephalotes isthmicola Weber, 1941
  • Atta cephalotes oaxaquensis Gonçalves, 1942
  • Atta cephalotes opaca Forel, 1904
  • Atta cephalotes polita Emery, 1905
  • Atta lutea Forel, 1893
  • Formica fervens Drury, 1782
  • Formica grossa Fabricius, 1787
  • Formica migratoria De Geer, 1773
  • Formica visitatrix Christ, 1791

Atta cephalotes, commonly known as the hairy-headed leafcutter ant, is a species of leafcutter ant in the tribe Attini (fungus-growing ants). A single colony of ants can contain up to 5 million members, and each colony has one queen that can live more than 20 years. The colony comprises different castes, known as "task partitioning", and each caste has a different job to do. This caste includes Minims, Medias and Majors.

Taxonomy

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The species is one of the earliest formally classified ants, first described by Swedish zoologist Carl Linnaeus in 1758. It was originally described as Formica cephalotes in his book the 10th edition of Systema Naturae, along with 16 other ant species, all placed within the genus Formica.[2] It was later transferred to a new genus, Atta, along with five other species by Danish zoologist Johan Christian Fabricius in 1804.[3] In 1911, American entomologist William Morton Wheeler designated A. cephalotes as the type species of Atta.[4] It was also designated as the type species of Oecodoma, but the genus is now a synonym of Atta.[5]

Biology and behaviour

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The elder workers manages the colony's rubbish dump. These ants are excluded from the rest of the colony. If any wander outside the dump, the other ants will kill them or force them back. Rubbish workers are often contaminated with disease and toxins, and live only half as long as their peers.[6] Ants lay pheromone trails as a method of communication to guide other ants to a discovered food source when returning to the nest.[7][8] Minims work in the nest, digging, tending fungi and taking care of brood. Additionally they can ride the backs of the larger caste members for transport or, more importantly, defending ants encumbered by leaves from parasitic insects such as phorid flies which will lay eggs in the heads of leafcutter ants. The media act as harvesters. They bring leaves back to the nest for fungus cultivation. Lastly the majors almost exclusively perform defensive tasks guarding harvesting trails from other insects. [9]

Distribution and habitat

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The species is widely distributed in the Neotropical region, from Mexico to Bolivia, with disjunct populations in Amazonas and north-eastern Brazil.[10]

Across the rainforest floor they typically occupy an area of approximately 200 square meters. They live in nests that can be as deep as 7 metres that they have carefully positioned so that a breeze can rid the nest of the dangerous levels of CO2 given off by the fungus they farm and eat.[11]

References

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  1. ^ "Species: Atta cephalotes". AntWeb. 2010-06-30. Retrieved 2010-08-20.
  2. ^ Linnaeus, C. (1758). Systema naturae per regna tria naturae, secundum classes, ordines, genera, species, cum characteribus, differentiis, synonymis, locis. Tomus I (10th ed.). Holmiae. (Laurentii Salvii). pp. 579–582.
  3. ^ Fabricius, J. C. 1804. Systema Piezatorum secundum ordines, genera, species, adjectis synonymis, locis, observationibus, descriptionibus. Brunswick: C. Reichard, p. 421
  4. ^ Wheeler, W. M. (1911). "A list of the type species of the genera and subgenera of Formicidae". Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. 21: 157–175. doi:10.1111/j.1749-6632.1911.tb56932.x. S2CID 85430772.
  5. ^ Swainson, W.; Shuckard, W.E. (1840). On the history and natural arrangement of insects. Vol. 104. London, UK: Longman, Brown, Green & Longman's. p. 174. doi:10.5962/bhl.title.32786. OCLC 4329243.
  6. ^ "Treated like garbage". New Scientist. 2001-01-20. Retrieved 2015-08-17.
  7. ^ Roces, Flavio; Hölldobler, Bert (1994-02-01). "Leaf density and a trade-off between load-size selection and recruitment behavior in the ant Atta cephalotes". Oecologia. 97 (1): 1–8. Bibcode:1994Oecol..97....1R. doi:10.1007/BF00317902. ISSN 1432-1939.
  8. ^ Jaffé, K.; Bazire-Benazét, M.; Howse, P. E. (1979-01-01). "An integumentary pheromone-secreting gland in Atta sp: Territorial marking with a colonyspecific pheromone in Atta cephalotes". Journal of Insect Physiology. 25 (10): 833–839. Bibcode:1979JInsP..25..833J. doi:10.1016/0022-1910(79)90086-6. ISSN 0022-1910.
  9. ^ "LibGuides: Leafcutter Ant (Atta cephalotes) Fact Sheet: Behavior & Ecology".
  10. ^ Corrêa, M.M.; Bieber, A.G.D.; Wirth, R.; Leal, I.R. (2005). "Occurrence of Atta cephalotes (L.) (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) in Alagoas, Northeastern Brazil". Neotropical Entomology. 34 (4): 695–698. doi:10.1590/S1519-566X2005000400023.
  11. ^ Sousa, Kátia K. A.; Camargo, Roberto S.; Caldato, Nadia; Farias, Adriano P.; Matos, Carlos A. O.; Zanuncio, José C.; Santos, Isabel C. L.; Forti, Luiz C. (December 2021). "Carbon dioxide levels in initial nests of the leaf-cutting ant Atta sexdens (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)". Scientific Reports. 11 (1): 20562. Bibcode:2021NatSR..1120562S. doi:10.1038/s41598-021-00099-8. ISSN 2045-2322. PMC 8523712. PMID 34663831.
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