Zusammenfassung
1. Most ants are more like plants and marine invertebrates than other insects because the adults are sessile and the immature stages are motile. 2. This paper reported the results from a field experiment that increased food levels on the fungus gardening ant, Trachymyrmex septentrionalis, which has served as a model system for understanding the complexities of these obligate mutualisms. 3. Food ...
Zusammenfassung
1. Most ants are more like plants and marine invertebrates than other insects because the adults are sessile and the immature stages are motile. 2. This paper reported the results from a field experiment that increased food levels on the fungus gardening ant, Trachymyrmex septentrionalis, which has served as a model system for understanding the complexities of these obligate mutualisms. 3. Food supplementation increased the growth of the symbiotic fungus and this led to an increase in the amount of fungal biomass. The amount of fungal biomass was generally more important in determining the amount of ant offspring than colony size. 4. The results indicate that the population is food limited and colonies may compete for relatively rare fungal substrate. However, competition in this species is not obvious.
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