Honeypot Ant


Photo: Greg Hume/Wikipedia

It's a scene straight out of a sci-fi movie: a lair of ants with huge, swollen abdomen used as living food storage. But that, Neatoramanauts, is not science fiction. It's science fact!

Meet the honeypot ant, which belly can expand to the size of grapes as worker ants keep on feeding it "honey" (such as sugary extracts from oak galls, nectaror even liquids from the body of preys). During tough times, the honeypot ant will regurgitate honey to feed its colony.

These honeypot ants are so valuable that rival ant colonies often try to kidnap them, and they're so tasty that Australian Aboriginal people like to eat them like candies! Yum!


Photo via National Geographic Photography Facebook page


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