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Photo Gallery - Big heads, little heads
Some examples of different big headed ant species. Here is Pheidole
rhea, North America's largest Pheidole species. - © Alex Wild
nursery and stuff it with more grub. For a certain amount of time
in her life as a baby, if her sisters feed her lots of high-protein
food (think smashed-up dead insects and Spam), a switch will flip
in her grubby little body and chemicals will change her into a big
headed major when she grows up. If her sisters just give her
regular food (some protein but also sugary treats), no switch flips,
and when she grows up she’ll be a little-headed big headed
minor. It’s that simple, and that beautiful. And it all comes down
to food. It makes me wonder about all those fried chicken dinners
at Gregory’s house.
Because workers do all the feeding, they can decide how many
big heads they want knocking around the nest. For example,
when other colonies move into the neighborhood, taking up
resources like food and nest space from the big-heads, workers
start pumping their babies with protein and making lots of
soldiers to prepare the nest for battle.
Don’t Quit Your Day Job
That’s right. Majors and minors come from the exact same eggs
and can have the exact same genetic makeup. Their physical
differences come out based on what their sisters feed them as
babies.
So here’s a baby big headed ant, a happy pearlescent porkie pie,
mouth gleefully open, hoping somebody will come into the
But the story of the big headed ant’s job doesn’t end with its size.
Once they’re grown, big headed ants, and ants in general, can’t
hold on to a job. Consider all the chores in an ant colony: baby
feeding, grocery shopping, taking the trash out, keeping out the
bad guys. Like people who need to learn how to roll over, crawl,
and then walk, big headed ant minors work different jobs as they
grow up.
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