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The use of the term "agriculture", which may not be entirely appropriate for mutualistic relationships—particularly in cases where a colony is hosted by a plant, such as a tree, in exchange for protection and aid in its survival and growth—is well documented in the scientific literature for processes where ants create crops and directly cultivate plants or fungi.
Most organisms forage, hunt, or use photosynthesis to get food, but around 50 million years ago — long before humans were around — ants began cultivating and growing their own food.
Ant–fungus mutualism is a symbiosis seen between certain ant and fungal species, in which ants actively cultivate fungus much like humans farm crops as a food source. There is only evidence of two instances in which this form of agriculture evolved in ants resulting in a dependence on fungi for food.
The scale of the farming done by fungus-farming ants can be compared to human's industrialized farming. [5] [11] [78] [79] A colony can "[defoliate] a mature eucalyptus tree overnight". [33] The cutting of leaves to grow fungus to feed millions of ants per colony has a large ecological impact in the subtropical areas in which they reside. [7]
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Aphid honeydew can provide an abundant food source for ants (aphids in the genus Tuberolachnus can secrete more honeydew droplets per hour than their body weight) and for some ants, aphids may be their only source of food. In these circumstances, ants may supplement their honeydew intake by preying on the aphids once the aphid populations have ...
Meat-eater ants feeding on a cicada: social ants cooperate and collectively gather food. Not all ants have the same kind of societies. The Australian bulldog ants are among the biggest and most basal of ants. Like virtually all ants, they are eusocial, but their social behaviour is poorly developed compared to other species. Each individual ...