Flying Ants are not Flies: Why do some ANTS have WINGS?

I stumbled upon a fascinating find in my garden—a pair of mating ants, with a queen and a male ant, and I managed to capture them under the microscope! In this video, I’ll show you their incredible details, explain why some ants have wings, and what happens during the mating season. You'll also see hundreds of winged males I found, and we’ll zoom in on their anatomy, including those tiny petiole nodes that connect the abdomen and thorax. This is a unique glimpse into the hidden world of ants!
#microscopy

[huldu]

I think I wrote this in a previous video but the drone(male) will die after mating as their reproductive organ is ripped out of their body by the queen during the mating process. Not sure if bees and wasps are similar in that regard. Anyways this is a reason why you may see a lot of dead drones after their flight.

[mikevanderman]

Loving it more, love that you're diversifying. Any you get a hold of, absolutely anything, put it under the microscope, just want to see more 🔬

[stolciusvonstolcenberg]

Great video (as aIways)! 😊

It would be interesting to see an experiment on potato slices as a medium for bacterial cultures, used by Koch as a method to obtain pure cultures (a technique he perhaps inferred from Joseph Schroeter). The first time I read about this pioneering experiment was in the book "Microbe Hunters" by Paul De Kruif (which I recommended to you a few years ago, do you remember?). Later, Koch abandoned this technique because pathogens rarely found the potato substrate appealing. However, this could actually be a positive aspect on an amateur level, as it would lower the risk of dangerous contamination... What do you think about this project?

[declup]

Are there any species of ants whose workers have retained their wasp ancestors' wings or re-evolved them?

I can understand that wings could be deleterious in general for most species of ants. But, since flight has been proven advantageous enough that, I think I've learned, it's arisen amongst insects at least a couple of times across their evolutionary past, I'm surprised it hasn't been helpful enough for any ant species at all to preserve that ability for their workers. If that is the case, I wonder why it's turned out that way.

[justinklenk]

I can't tell who's the Bottom.