Which ants feed on seeds? First of all, these are, of course, Messor harvesters – an ideal genus for beginner antkeepers. Messors can live for a long time on one grain, getting everything they need from it, but many other ants cannot do this.
Should you feed seeds, for example, to Formica? Of course not! However… In nature, they can actually collect them. It’s all about special appendages on fresh seeds of some plants. Such appendages are called elaiosomes, they are rich in a complex of fats. Foragers carry the seeds far from the mother plant, eat the elaiosome, and throw away or bury everything else. In any case, the seed germinates.
Gardeners are clearly not happy about this: in the photo, Formica exsectoides are carrying away the seeds of the milkweed, which is a weed. But the milkweed itself not only feeds the formica with particles of its seeds, but also provides nectar during flowering.
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