To count the ants in the world is a practical challenge indeed. But, it is safe to say ten million billion, at least.
Ants can be thought of as omnipresent - they are present everywhere across the earths land mass with the exception of Greenland, Iceland and the Antarctic.
Wilson and Holldobler commented in Journey to the Ants that there are over 300 species of ant in eight hectors of Peruvian rainforest and Levieux identified 7,000 distinct colonies in a single Hector of Ivorian savannah.
A so-called supercolony on the Japanese island of Hokkaido was found to have over a million queens and 306 million workers all living in an area less than 3 square kilometres.
Another such interrelated population is thought to exist between North America, Europe and Japan over a coastal area exceeding 4,500 miles. If this turns out to be the case, the number of individuals could easily extend into the billions.
Tags: Frequently Asked Question | Behaviour
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