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Crazy Ants: What’s in a Name?

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

They have names like Pharaoh, sugar, and fire. And now we have another name for one of their kind: crazy.

Crazy ants are very erratic and fast moving. So, they act like they’re crazy, essentially.

Mike Quinn, an invertebrate biologist, says the Rasberry crazy ant, named after the Texas exterminator who identified it in 2002, has covered a lot of ground.

It’s already spread to the Louisiana border, and may already be beyond. Crazy ants are tropical ants that need temperatures and high high humidity. So, the conditions are favorable from Houston, back to Florida. And it could easily spread through that whole region in somewhat short order.

We know very little about this alien species.

We do not know how it got here. We do not know where it came from. We do not know much of its biology. We are truly at the beginning stages of understanding this ant.

What we do know is the species has multiple queens, and produces super colonies of millions of ants. Typical of ants, they’re drawn to electrical devices…with potentially devastating results.

They can shut down chemical facilities. They can potentially shut down an airport. They can shut down NASA. This ant is something to be reckoned with.

More about crazy ants tomorrow.

That’s out show…for Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 6th, 2009 at 12:00 am and is filed under Podcasts, Shows. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

One Response to “Crazy Ants: What’s in a Name?”

  1. jk minton Says:
    August 1st, 2009 at 7:04 pm

    Ok, so I have searched everywhere for this ant, and it sounds like it might be the crazy ant. However, it doesn’t look like the crazy ant. The majority of these ants are small and very fast. When one finds my dogs food it goes back to the mound and gets more friends. Then about every 20th or so ant, there is a larger ant with a huge head and mandibules. Thsy get together and 10 or more small ants and one of the large ants carry the entire piece of food back to the mound. Lol, these are not fire ants, I have lived in houston all my life I know the difference. If you can help me let me know.