How Do Queen Ants Reproduce? A Full Analysis of Their Reproduction Methods

Unlike ordinary insects, ants rely on the queen ant for reproduction. And her main duties are to lay eggs, reproduce offspring and oversee this large group family.So how does the queen ant reproduce? How long does she live?

1. How does the queen ant reproduce?

Queen ants all carry out reproduction by laying eggs. After completing mating, she will dig a vertical shaft on her own and hollow out a small chamber about 6 cm wide. Then she reproduces offspring inside it.

The number of eggs a queen ant lays each day differs slightly depending on the species, generally around 500 to 1000, but not all species can lay eggs every day at every population stage of the colony; some ants even show a tendency to lay eggs seasonally. A single queen ant can lay tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands or even more eggs in her lifetime. After a new queen ant establishes a colony, as the number of worker ants increases she will gradually lose the ability to find food on her own, and in the end even eating must be fed to her by worker ants. The queen ant also has a clever trick: she can lay eggs whether or not they are fertilized, and unfertilized eggs will develop into male ants.

2. How long is the lifespan of a queen ant?

An ant queen can live as long as 20 years. But an ant separated from its colony can only live a few days.

The queen of termites also has a very long lifespan, generally living 15—30 years, and some can even live sixty or seventy years.