Watch: Ants construct a "living bridge" to attack a wasp nest
Ants are known to collectively work in a remarkably efficient way to achieve a particular objective, whether it is to cart food thousands of time heavier than them or to chart their way to safe territories. This quality was in ample display in a video which captured the moment when millions of ants got together and worked towards building a "living bridge" just to invade a giant wasp nest. The perfectly arranged insects were caught on camera in Brazil when they were forming the bizarre build in order to attack the enemy.
Francisco Boni, an electrical engineer, captured the footage and uploaded in on social media. He captioned the video on Twitter with: "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."
He later added, "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!"
Boni then went on to explain how the entire arrangement was supposed to work out for the laborious ants and their mission. He said, "For ants it is more effective to follow the trail over a bridge that goes down and then up than in an inverted upside down walk."
He added, "Also likely that upside down the ants can't carry significant loads." Within one day of being uploaded, the amazing footage had already been watched nearly 400,000 times and retweeted nearly 5,000 times, reports the Daily Mail.
For those who aren't aware of this, 'legionary ants' are widely known all over the world for their aggressive techniques, especially when it comes to gathering food for themselves.
