[News] Ants Use Bacteria to Make Their Gardens Grow

[Galapagos]

ScienceDaily (Nov. 24, 2009) — Leaf-cutter ants, which cultivate fungus for food, have many remarkable qualities.

Here's a new one to add to the list: the ant farmers, like their human counterparts, depend on nitrogen-fixing bacteria to make their gardens grow. The finding, reported Nov. 20 in the journal Science, documents a previously unknown symbiosis between ants and bacteria and provides insight into how leaf-cutter ants have come to dominate the American tropics and subtropics.

Ants use bacteria to make their gardens grow

[Moontanman]

Great article, ants are so interesting, i used to keep ant farms, an ant farm of leaf cutter ants would be great. Watching then tend their gardens would be very interesting. Do these ant keep underground livestock as well? i wonder if the creatures we see as parasite on the ants are really pets? wow I am really out there today! Great post Galapagos, thanks.