An amazing clip that apparently shows a bunch of ants forming a bridge together to attack a wasp's nest has gone viral - and you can see why:
Advert
The footage was posted to Twitter by Francisco Boni, who wrote: "Attack of legionary ants (also known as army ants or marabunta) to a wasp honeycomb. Impressive the level of swarm intelligence and collective computation to form that bridge."
The video has now been viewed 700,000 times, and has also racked up 23,000 likes and almost 10,000 retweets.
Further into the thread, Boni explained more about the incredible scene, adding: "When this type of attack happens, the wasps usually escape and the ants do not leave until they've completely looted the honeycomb, carrying pupae, larvae, and eggs, as well as some adults who did not manage to escape.
"They can even build across the water!"
Referencing EarthSky, Boni also explained that many species of ants find it tricky to walk upside down. Apparently for ants, it's more effective to follow the trail over a bridge that 'goes down and then up' than having to navigate an inverted upside-down walk.
Advert
Another Twitter user, @godie1998, also took a stab at working out how this strange bridge started to take form.
They wrote: "They probably started as a straight path and started adding ants as gravity pulled the whole bunch down, so the bridge doesn't end up breaking due to linear tension. So the first minutes they built the bottom part (looks less vertical) and added on the extremes on necessity.
"It's only a hypothesis but - proportional to time - their bridge is perfectly reflective of gravitational pull of an object on free fall (so, as time went on, they expanded the bridge more frequently due to increased weight)."
Ah, nature. When you're not busy throwing us giant huntsman spiders and creepily huge, sex-seeking moths, you really can be pretty cool.
Advert
Featured Image Credit: Facebook/El Entomólogo
Topics: Viral, Awesome, Interesting, Animals