Each Fire Ant Queen produces:

• sterile eggs that are eaten
• fertilised eggs that produce sterile female workers
• fertilised eggs that are capable of reproduction (may be future queens)
• unfertilised eggs that become males

Food supply, the environment and worker behaviour determine what type of eggs are produced.

Reproduction is dependant on the weather. One or two days after rain at about 10.00am, the workers open holes in the nest to let the reproductives out for a mating flight.

Ideal conditions include:

• the temperature above 24oC
• not too windy
• generally sunny

Mating takes place 90-300m in the air. The male dies. The fertilised female selects potential sites and after landing breaks off her wings and builds a vertical tunnel 7 to 25cm deep.

Her chance of establishing a colony is 1%. Most perish from predators at this stage.

She seals herself off to lay 10-20 eggs a day which become the first workers. These workers are uniformly small as their food supply is regurgitated oil from her crop. She does not eat at this time.

Once the workers mature the mated female becomes a queen attended by the workers. Within six to twelve months, the queen is capable of producing approximately 800 eggs per day, every day.

click the picture to find out information about the science of a fire ant nest ...

A mature colony contains up to 400 000 worker ants.

Fire ants also spread naturally during floods. Whole colonies float out of the soil and form large rafts of ants. These rafts ground on higher land the colonies are re-established. This adaption not only allows fire ants to survive floods but to extend their territory. Floods are usually a natural control for ant species.

Fire ants feed on invertebrates, oily, sugary foods and sterile eggs. They eat ticks, boll weevils, sugar cane borer, cornear worm, lacewings, ants, corn crops. However, the reduction of some of these insects are beneficial to the sugar cane, cotton and cattle industries. Yet most people in these industries would still prefer NOT to have the ants.