Fire Ants in U.S. Adopt Unusual Communal Lifestyle

Fire ants follow a prim and proper social system in their native Argentina. But in America, they turn into hippies, forming communes where unrelated queens share nests and everybody helps raise the kids, according to entomologist Kenneth Ross of the University of Georgia.

Unlike the Argentina ant, the fire ant in the United States has no natural enemies, Ross wrote in the April 2 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Partly for this reason, the pest has spread throughout the South and Southwest since its accidental introduction into the United States 60 years ago. The high density of infestation and the lack of predators may have led to the change in lifestyle, he said.