TO DIE FOR THE QUEEN!

in #insects8 years ago (edited)

Some worker ants of the species Camponotus cylindricus living on the island of Borneo, ready to literally explode from the inside out for the sake of the colony and the Queen.

 So, if an ant of this species will notice on their territory the stranger, he immediately clung to his limb with his powerful jaws, and then blow themselves up, spilling onto the stunned neprijatelja sticky yellow liquid. This fluid consists of various irritating chemicals and strong adhesive, it can firmly stick the corpse of C. cylindricus to the enemy. Is the liquid in special containers, which occupy almost half of the body of the ant (the tanks are arranged from the base of the head to the tip of the abdomen). To explode an ant squeezes its abdomen so much that the liquid breaks the back of the body of an ant and spills out.

Where does the body of an ant is a harmful substance? According to researchers, this fluid is generated by microbes in the organism of ants, which help to digest food, as well as substances contained in certain mushrooms that feed on Camponotus cylindricus.

Interestingly, species-suicide are among the termite Neocapritermes taracua, which likewise protect the colony from enemies. So, if next to the mound appear to outsiders, old females Neocapritermes taracua begin to attack them.

First, to the swing jaw, but if the enemy does not retreat, the female termites use a secret weapon. At the junction of the thorax and abdomen of all female workers by age appear two tanks with a bluish substance – crystalline protein. And under them are the salivary glands, which, when necessary, enter into a chemical reaction with protein. As a result, the thermite explodes and squirts a toxic fluid of the enemy, who soon dies.


#nature#insects #ants 

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