Ants Rip Queen's Legs Off | Empire Of The Desert Ants | BBC Earth

In the final days of empire, the colony is at its most vulnerable; and the Queen meets her final grisly end.

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Natural World: Empire Of The Desert Ants
Against the Chiricahua Mountains of southern Arizona, Empire of the Desert Ants takes an in-your-face look at the violent world of desert honey ants by charting the fate of a single colony over several years as they battle all-comers for survival and dominance over the small patch of desert that is their world. Both the big picture and every minute detail are captured in this dramatic and fascinating film using the latest camera techniques and visual effects. Macro-photography shows the heart of their epic confrontations and the very core of life in the honey ant colony. Battle plans, defensive strategies and 'team' tactics are presented using the latest battlefield technologies. Also revealed are parallel worlds dominated by hidden forces - chemical weaponry, ultra-sonic sound, pheromones, ultra-violet and polarised light - as well as detailed characterisations of the different members of the colony.

Welcome to BBC EARTH! The world is an amazing place full of stories, beauty and natural wonder. Here you'll find 50 years worth of entertaining and thought-provoking natural history content. Dramatic, rare, and exclusive, nature doesn't get more exciting than this.

[eriana]

Me: Having a nice picnic.

Ants: Battling over water, Beheading the queen, taking children for later consumption.

[alinelks]

Opened the video for curiosity, stayed for the dramatic narration.

[GameboySX]

Imagine doing all this work to kill this colony and then some kid comes and jumps on you or pours water on you

[HeyBusterLuke]

As a kid in Australia I remember sitting watching an ant fight in the garden between groups of red and black ants. Next day I went to look again, and there was a big neat pyramid of dead black ants, and red ants dragging more dead black ones from holes in the ground and adding them to the pile. It seemed fascinatingly brutal - as I’d slept in my bed just metres away, this whole bleak and terrible night of tiny but merciless warfare and carnage had played out, and next day they were silently tidying up

[micycles]

"Humans are the only beings that have war."

Bugs: Annihilate a whole kingdom because a couple dudes got lost.

[jsthecanuck]

you’d think the title overdramaticised it but the invading ants literally executed the queen medeival style

[frankmorin]

“Her empire still


Boi I can’t wait to get recommended for the second part....

[judgementkazzy]

"Man is the only species on earth that wages war with itself"
Ants: *sees another colony and proceeds to rip the colonies queen limb from limb just because*

[antnewsreporter]

If you're wondering who filmed this, it was me.

[greciacastro]

Let us praise the brave Ant journalist who risked his/her life to film these historic events.

[wy]

These damn character designs are so similar you can't tell who's on whose side!

[Medieval_Dead]

I had two small black ant colonies around my house. One lived within the cracks of the driveway, the other near the side of the house. They lived in relative peace with one another for over 10 years until one night I came outside and discovered a full blown war involving tens of thousands of ants was taking place.

It was near impossible to see what was going one or who was winning. The battle consisted of two giant mounds fighting with smaller amounts fighting around the perimeters. Due to neither side having a physical advantage the strategy was 2v1 to eliminate a fighter. 1v1 fights were stalemates until another came along, checked to see which one was on their side and then the kill would happen. It was a war of numbers. Once a fighter was dead or disabled they would let the body go and the process would continue on throughout the night.

I came out early the next morning eager to check on the progress of the war and a clear winner had been decided. The driveway ants came out victorious. They had now broken into two groups. One group was on body recovery while the other group was deemed the invasion force, driving into the nest of the defeated side house colony to kill off any straggles, clear out their stores and eliminate their queen. No quarter was taken, it was pure annihilation. This was about 4 years ago now and the driveway ants are still thriving to this day. Their story of struggle, famine, war and perseverance unknown to all but them. RIP to the side house colony, your energy lives on through the victors.

[stevennatera]

Those few ants that started a fight got his whole colony annihilated

[meritdavey]

“Some dead workers are carried off for processing.”

Amazon Corporate: “Write that down! Write that down!”

[slash]

crazy to think that battles like this happen every day just outside your house.

It's been a long war for over a full year now, these are war torn battle grounds. Enter at your own risk for you have been warned.

[bozoforce]

The camera ant never dies. He always gets the best footage. Crawling past the front lines to document and record the brutality of War.

[Benskie]

You: Relaxing and chilling outside.



Ants: *SILENTLY STARTS WW3*

[zawarudo]

Imagine the PTSD the ant camera man must've had while watching his brothers and queen die.

[brenon]

Imagine being the queen ant watching the cameraman do nothing while she's literally being torn apart.

[SeekGrace]

I wonder what they're saying to queen in ant language while ripping her apart.