アリが列を作って歩く理由は？地面に残すフェロモンの道しるべ

Why Do Ants Walk in a Line?

Have you ever seen ants walking in a long line?

They go from their nest to a piece of food, one after another.

How do they know the way?

Many ants use a chemical smell called a pheromone.

First, an ant called a forager goes out to look for food.

When it finds food, it goes back to the nest.

On the way back, it leaves pheromone along the ground.

Other ants find this trail and follow it to the food.

Ants have antennae, and they use them to detect chemicals.

Each ant that carries food home adds more pheromone to the trail.

So a good trail gets stronger, and more ants come.

What happens when the food is gone?

The returning ants stop adding pheromone, and the scent slowly fades away.

A trail can also help ants find a shorter way.

If something blocks the path, the ants leave it and look for new routes.

An ant that finds a new way leaves a new trail on its way home, and this trail marks the shortest route.

Trails that work well attract more ants, and in the end the best path is found.

More than 13,800 kinds of ants are known today.

Some colonies have only a few dozen ants, and others have millions.

Next time you see a line of ants, remember that they are following a message left on the ground.