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They forage solitarily for food such as dead insects, seeds, and sugary plant exudates and are well known for their ability to store liquids in the abdomens of specialized workers, the so-called repletes or "honey pots", hence their common name "red honey ant" (the genus name Melophorus means "honey carrier"). [2]
They are notoriously aggressive hunters able to subdue formidable prey such as bees and other ants. Unable to eat solid food, adult ants feed on juices from the prey insects; the meat of the prey is fed to the colony's larvae. Their diet is supplemented by the workers' own trophic eggs, which are commonly fed to the queen and larvae.
The food is first ground to a bread-like consistency using the ants' large mandibles, and is then stored in a granary, assuring the colony access to food year-round. Seed collection on behalf of the red harvester ants benefits their ecosystem through the process of myrmecochory , in which ants aid in the dispersal of seeds while foraging for food.
Therefore, once the P. rebeli begin to mimic the sound of the queen ant, the worker ants begin to treat the P. rebeli as if it were the queen ant. [16] On the other hand, the queen ant treats the P. rebeli larvae and pupae as if they were rivals, as she is the only one in the colony that recognizes that the P. rebeli larvae are not ant larvae ...
The queen is a moderately large butterfly, with an average wingspan of 3.1 inches (7.9 cm) to 3.3 inches (8.4 cm). It is easily distinguishable from its relative the monarch by its darker brown ground colour, and lack of stripes decorating the wings. [5] [19] The queen bears a closer resemblance to the soldier (Danaus eresimus). [18]
A queen ant (formally known as a gyne) is an adult, reproducing female ant in an ant colony; she is usually the mother of all the other ants in that colony. Some female ants, such as the Cataglyphis , do not need to mate to produce offspring, reproducing through asexual parthenogenesis or cloning , and all of those offspring will be female. [ 1 ]
Adults lay their eggs on plants of the genus Rumex, which later become the larval food plants. This butterfly gets its name from the brightly colored wings of the males, which are important in sexual selection. [4] Its larvae exhibit mutualism with red ants, and are often raised in ant nests until they reach adulthood. [5]
They are also called brush-footed butterflies or four-footed butterflies, because they are known to stand on only four legs while the other two are curled up; in some species, these forelegs have a brush-like set of hairs, which gives this family its other common name.