is there a way to know the gender of an ant?
404865
Actually, in the social hymenoptera (bees, wasps, and ants) the workers in any colony will all be the DAUGHTERS of the queen.  They are all female.\n\nIn most species, the workers are sterile, and cannot produce their own offspring.  In some of the more 'primitive' species, like Pharaoh ants, the workers can become fertile and can move off to form their own colonies if there is stress on the mother hive - each one becoming a queen.  In many of the more 'advanced' social hymenoptera, the ovipositor (the structure used for laying eggs) becomes modified in the workers into a stinger, since it is no longer needed for egg laying.  The stinger of the honeybee, which is barbed and rips out after stinging is the most derived form of this, but stingers can be found in many wasps, and even ants.\n\nThe males of the hives, known as drones in most social insects have no stinger, because they never had an ovipositor.  The number of males in a hive varies depending on the species.  In some species the drones are indolent wastrels, hanging out in the hive doing nothing just waiting for the call to come perform some sweet sweet lovin' for the queen.  In most species, the males also forage, going out and drinking nectar and the like, but because their numbers are much lower than the worker females of the hive and they don't have the specialized structures such as pollen baskets, their contribution is not as significant.\n\nIn most hives, the number of males is around 10 to 15% of the total population.\n\nMale honeybees can be identified by their long, cylindrical bodies in comparison with the workers, and their two very large compound eyes that nearly meet up on the top of their head.\n\nBecause they are pretty much a drain on the resources, and not required for short-term survival, the males are often kicked out of the hive when food becomes scarce, or when winter begins to draw near.\n\nWithout looking at the genitalia of the ant in question, it may be difficult to determine if it is a drone or not.  If it has wings it is either a queen or a male.  In many ants, the male has a smaller head and larger eyes, but I'm not sure if that applies in all ants or not.
116917
I don't think anybody will be able to pin it down to one specific insect species, because first, how do you measure smartness, and how do you compare it between species, which show very different behavior. \nAs far as complexity of behavior and brain size is concerned, I think the social insects as a group will be smarter than the non-social ones. Being social adds a whole new repertoire of behavior due to the need to constantly interact with nestmates versus non-nestmates. In addition, social insect species have a home - which they have to find again!\nSocial insect behavior range from dance communication of honey bees, to pheromone communication of ants, pathfinding in ants, individual face recognition in some wasps species. \n\nAs far as specific sources are concerned, there are many papers published, below a link to a random one which came up when I typed in "learning memory insect". You will be able to find thousands more.
574713
im taking a wild guess.  ant?  as in ant hill??
305331
The first was a large termite, perhaps a male, which are rare except during the mating time-they are white, very similar to ants, and have a much softer body.\nThe second was likely some species of dung beetle, which are common in that area, and can be quite colorful
185195
I would think the army ant.
110091
An ant can see only in two dimensions. A man can see in three dimensions. Man cannot (usually) imagine beyond an extreme of four dimensions (taking time as 4th). An ant cannot understand how a human exists. There could be (and definetly would be )creatures which percieve in other dimensions, which man cannot understand. They need not be in the same three dimensionsions that man percieves. One should therefore never deny the existance of other(probably more intelligent) creatures.
442587
something that represent our gender.
730489
They belong to the order Hymenoptera, this means they are most closely related to bees, wasps, and sawflies. Ants are characterised by having a very narrow waist between the thorax and the abdomen, this places them in the sub-order Apocrita.\nAnts are one of the most social insect on the planet, and the bulk weight of all the ants in the tropics is more than the combined weight of all the humans on earth.\nAnts are wingless except for the reproductives. Queens will have what is called a nuptual flight where they emerge from a nest and mate with a single male. The female then starts her own colony and used the stored sperm from that one mating for the rest of her life, she can produce hundreds of thousands of eggs with this single sperm donation.\nAnt societies have different demographics, called castes, these include workers (sterile females) soldiers (with large mandibles) and one queen, sometimes more, depending on the species.\nAnts eat virtually anything, from organic materials to other insects, to pollen, nectar and honeydew (produced by aphids)\nSome ants grow their own food, like in leaf-cutter ants. They will cut pieces leaves and transport them to special chambers underground where they grow mushrooms which feed on the leaves.\n\nthats all that comes to mind for now, hope this helps!
151792
- Ant communication is primarily through chemicals called pheromones. Because most ants spend their time in direct contact with the ground, these chemical messages are more developed than in other Hymenopterans. So, for instance, when a forager finds food on its way home (found typically through remembered landmarks and the position of the sun), it will leave a trail along the ground, which in a short time other ants will follow. When they return home they will reinforce the trail, bringing other ants, until the food is exhausted, after which the trail is not reinforced and so slowly dissipates. A crushed ant will emit an alarm pheromone, that in high concentration sends other ants nearby into an attack frenzy, and in lower concentration attracts them, while a few ants use what are called propaganda pheromones to confuse their enemies.\n\n- Ant trails have no intrinsic polarity; that is to say, an ant walking on a straight non-branching trail cannot tell whether it is walking to or from the nest. Trails always divide as a "Y", with the two secondary trails at a 60 degree angle to each other, and it is the geometry at trail junctions that give ant trails polarity. (Jackson et al, 2004)\n\n- Like other insects, ants smell with their antennae, which are long and thin. These are fairly mobile, having a distinct elbow joint after an elongated first segment, and since they come in pairs they provide information about direction as well as intensity. Pheromones are also exchanged as compounds mixed in with the food interchanged in trophallaxis, giving the ants information about one another's health and nutrition. Ants can also detect what task group (e.g. foraging or nest maintenance) other ants belong to. Of special note, the queen produces a special pheromone without which the workers will begin raising new queens.\n\n- Ants attack and defend themselves by biting, and in many species, stinging, in both cases sometimes injecting chemicals into the target. Of special note here is formic acid.\n\n- While many types of animals can learn behaviors by imitating other animals, ants may be the only group of animals besides humans in which interactive teaching behavior has been observed. Knowledgeable forager ants of the species Temnothorax albipennis directly lead naive nestmates to newly discovered food sources by an excruciatingly slow (and time-costly), process of 'tandem running'. The follower thereby obtains knowledge that it would not have, had it not been tutored, and this is at the expense of its nestmate teacher. Both leader and follower are acutely sensitive to the progress of their partner. For example, the leader slows down when the follower lags too far behind, and speeds up when the follower gets too close, whereas the follower does the opposite (Franks and Richardson, 2006).\n--------------------
434112
i think i had heard somewhere that females have the red marking on a different side than the males do...i'm not positive about this though
303496
Sex determination: sex is based on number of X chromosomes. grasshopper XO male, XX is female. \n\nTaxonomy of one species of grasshopper: http://www.cnr.vt.edu/fishex/nmex_main/species/082715.htm\n\nThis is an excellent source for the feeding behavior: http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/Entomology/courses/en507/papers_1999/nadeau.htm\n\nMovement of Grasshopper:\nJointed appendages move for locomotion\nThinner at joints to allow movement\nAppendages are weight bearing: allows for crawling and jumping\nMuscles are not associated with body wall\nMuscles bundles on inside, attached to exoskeleton\nAntagonistic pairs allow movement of appendage in both directions\nThird pair of legs are long with powerful muscles for jumping\nTwo pairs of wings for flight\nAnterior pair stiff like fixed wings of planes\nPosterior pair are membranous provide lift and propulsion\n(source: http://www.ucs.mun.ca/~iemerson/lectures1001/lecfram24.html)
902532
an ant is about one millimetre tall and my dec(k) is 6 inches (150 mm)
427450
there are several diferent methods of sexing canaries. i have listed a good sight below that will help you good luck
1170155
LOL..Its cute. I wouldnt really consider the name "roach" really having a gender associated with it.
196017
Bet's the hell out of me but I'll guess. is it an ant. LOL
306882
to check whether elephant was wearing mouse's underwear...\n\nhe he he\n\nBTW it was ANT !!!
795228
That doesn't sound right, if they're talking about critters that have sexual intercourse at all (as opposed to procreating other ways).\n\nI would think that most females have, as males aren't all that choosy about where they donate their sperm.\n\nToo bad you don't say where you got this. I mean, besides "the net" -- oh, THERE, that tiny place.\n\n;-)\n\nUnless it's more a comment on life expectancy, saying that most critters die before they have a chance to, well, you know.\n\nSo, where'd you come across this tidbit, what animals are included in the statistic, and why would this be?\n\n(I'll check back in hopes you respond.)\n\nEdit: You may (if you're interested enough) want to troll around newscientist.com and similar sites. New Scientist is the UK's version of Scientific American -- the site has science news, and search facility (though you have to pay to access everything, they do have a lot available for non-subscribers).\n\nI may give it a go next time I'm there.\n\nTrouble is, coming from a non-expert (that is, a psychologist), I wonder if this is one of those non-facts that gets picked up and repeated and is completely wrong.\n\nThough, if you include all animals, including insects, then maybe. Relatively few bees and ants, for example, have sex, and they'd account for a big proportion of "all animals."\n\nIn which case it's completely irrelevant to a discussion of human sexuality.