To catch very large prey, the arboreal ant, Azteca andreae, which live in a mutualistic association with a host plan, gather on side by side on leaf edges with their mandible open. When a prey lands on the plan they grab it with their mandibles which together with the hairy underside of the leaf acts as Velcro preventing prey, weighing up to 13,000 times as much as the ant, to escape.

The study recently published in PLoS One by French and Spanish biologists investigated the predatory behaviour of the ant Azteca andreae in French Guiana. The and lives in a close mutualistic relationship with its host, Cecropia obtuse, which in return for the ant’s protection from herbivores offer it accommodation in its hollow stems and nectar from extrafloral nectar bodies. However, the nectar is relatively poor in proteins and amino acids, so the ants supplement it by active hunting.

The researchers spent 22 days in the field monitoring the hunting techniques of the ants and found that they wait in ambush on the underside of their host plant’s leaves, predominantly at the rim, and rush at landing prey in great numbers. The largest prey that was caught during the observational period was a 18 cm long locust, weighing almost 19 g or up to 13,000 times the weight of a single worker and prey weighing several thousand times the weight of individual workers were routinely caught.

To test the strength of an individual worker ant, the researchers attached small weight to string, which they placed near the ant’s mandibles causing it to crap onto it. They found that they can hold a weight up to 5000 times their individual weight, but only when they are on their the leaves of their host plant. Apparently the hairy underside of these leaf acts together with the ant’s claws like Velcro and allow the ants to adhere to the plant even when holding large weights.

Source:
Alain Dejean, Celine Leroy, Bruno Corbara, Olivier Roux, Regis Cereghino, Jerome Orivel,
Raphael Boulay (2010) Arboreal Ants Use the ‘‘Velcro Principle’’ to Capture Very Large Prey. PLoS ONE 5(6): e11331. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0011331   

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