Sunning clusters of ants contribute significantly, but weakly to spring heating in the nests of the red wood ants, Formica polyctena

Result code in IS VaVaI

<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F60077344%3A_____%2F25%3A00637172" target="_blank" >RIV/60077344:_____/25:00637172 - isvavai.cz</a>

Alternative codes found

RIV/00216208:11310/25:10500198

Result on the web

<a href="https://ejes.cz/index.php/ejes/article/view/1299" target="_blank" >https://ejes.cz/index.php/ejes/article/view/1299</a>

DOI - Digital Object Identifier

<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.14712/23361964.2025.4" target="_blank" >10.14712/23361964.2025.4</a>

Result language

angličtina

Original language name

Sunning clusters of ants contribute significantly, but weakly to spring heating in the nests of the red wood ants, Formica polyctena

Original language description

Red wood ants perform sun-basking behavior in the spring. This very conspicuous behaviour consists from densely packed bodies of ants, forming sunning clusters, which expose themselves to sun radiation. This led to rapid increase in ant body temperature. The expectation was that the ants so heated that return to the nest may bring heat from outside, which heats the nest. Although this was postulated a long time ago, the effect of sun-basking behaviour on nest heating has not been tested. Filling this gap is the subject of this study. To do this the presence of sunning clusters on 10 Formica polyctena nests was recorded using camera-traps, which recorded presence of sunning clusters on the nest surface daily from March 10 to June 3, 2016 in the south of the Czech Republic. Camera traps also recorded external air temperature. At the same time, internal nest temperatures were measured by thermometers located inside the nests, which continually recorded nest temperature over the same period. Comparison of consecutive days without and with sunning clusters of ants revealed an increase in internal nest temperature occurred when clustering was recorded. This, however, was only recorded for nests in which the temperature did not go above 20 °C. Frequency of daily occurrence of sunning clusters (proportion of days on which clusters were observed) was significantly positively correlated with daily increase in the internal temperature of the nests. This holds even when the increase in the internal temperature of the nests is corrected for increase that occurs at the same external temperature, but in the absence of clustering. This statistical evidence clearly indicates that sun-basking contributes to the heating of nests in spring, but it is very low. This is supported by the fact that nests that differ substantially in the frequency of occurrence of sunning clusters do not differ significantly in internal nest temperature in spring.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

J_imp - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

40104 - Soil science

Project

Result was created during the realization of more than one project. More information in the Projects tab.

Continuities

I - Institucionalni podpora na dlouhodoby koncepcni rozvoj vyzkumne organizace

Publication year

2025

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů

Name of the periodical

European Journal of Environmental Sciences

ISSN

1805-0174

e-ISSN

2336-1964

Volume of the periodical

15

Issue of the periodical within the volume

1

Country of publishing house

CZ - CZECH REPUBLIC

Number of pages

6

Pages from-to

28-33

UT code for WoS article

001523489700004

EID of the result in the Scopus database

2-s2.0-105008280974