Insects
Ants
Formicidae
An ant queen can live for up to 20 years, while a worker — a sterile female — lives only 3–4 years. During summer, a queen can lay around 300 eggs per day, which adds up to approximately 600,000 eggs over her lifetime.
Fertilized eggs develop into females, while unfertilized eggs become males. The queen mates only once in her life, storing enough sperm to fertilize eggs for many years. The male dies shortly after mating.
Did you know that:
A large anthill can consume up to two million insects in a single summer!
There are around 60 different ant species in Sweden, the largest of which is the horse ant.
Anthills are usually built facing south to capture as much solar heat as possible.
A single large anthill can contain as many as 500,000 ants.
Conservation status
