African driver ants hunt in colossal swarms of up to 20 million members, completely blind, relying primarily on pheromones for communication. Driver ant queens are the largest living ants known, with the biggest measuring between 40-63 millimetres (1.5-2.4 inches) in total body length.
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- "As with humans, their greatest enemies are the same species. At the frontier they detect friend or foe by smell and interlopers are repulsed…"
All that to say, they’re not to be messed with. And in this clip from the BBC’s Natural World, this slug wound up in the wrong place, at the wrong time.
First, only one ant makes contact with the unsuspecting mollusc lounging on a leaf, then another, and another. Soon, the victim is surrounded, with nowhere to go – except downwards.
“Slugs are fair game for driver ants. They don’t run away,” narrates actor Andrew Sachs.
The slug takes the escape route, but unfortunately, the ants follow. And it turns out that more of them are waiting below.
The ants begin smothering the prey, but the slug has one more trick up its sleeve – its entire body is covered in thick and noxious slime, and as the ants sink their jaws into the slug’s flesh, they get stuck.
Some of the other ants try to give a helping hand, but to no avail. Then, something remarkable happens.
In an incredible feat of ingenuity, the driver ants begin to bring over soil particles and cover the slug’s body – essentially soaking up the slime like ink on blotting paper.
“Gradually, the slug disappears under a writhing mass of earth and ants,” concludes Sachs, as the slug is slowly sliced up by the ferocious insects.
Top image credit: feathercollector/Getty Images
