Battles between ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae): a review

Abstract

Abstract With their unique colony structure, competition between ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae) can be particularly intense, with colonies potentially willing to sacrifice large number of individuals to obtain resources or territory under the right circumstances. In this review, we cover circumstances in which ant competition escalates into combat, battle strategies and tactics, and analysis methods for these battles. The trends for when colonies choose to fight can vary greatly dependent on the species and situation, which we review in detail. Because of their large group sizes, ant conflicts can follow different patterns than many other species, with a variety of specialist adaptations and battle strategies, such as specialized worker classes and the need to rapidly recruit large number of compatriots. These same large group sizes also can make ant fighting amenable to mathematical analysis, particularly in the context of Lanchester’s laws that consider how total numbers influence the outcome of a confrontation. Yet, dynamic behavior can often disrupt idealized mathematical predictions in real-world scenarios, even though these can still shed light on the explanations for such behavior. We also systematically cover the literature on battles between groups of ants, presenting several other interesting studies on species with unique colony organization, such as army ants and leafcutter ants.