Hobbies And Interests
Horned Lizard Food
The horned lizard of the western United States primarily feed on harvester ants. Healthy harvester ant populations mean healthy horned lizard populations.
Important Ant-Farm Ants
Most ant farms are populated by red harvester ants. Ant farms provide an educational arena for children to learn more about ant behaviors such as foraging, colony-building and tunnel engineering.
Seed Storage
The main job of a harvester ant is to forage for seeds and then store the seeds below-ground inside the colony. After a drought, seeds stored by harvester ants can cause grasses and plants near colonies to rebound more quickly.
Soil Aerators
Through colony-building, harvester ants unwittingly aerate soil, which in turn allows for better drainage and higher moisture content in soil.
Plant Distributors
As harvester ants busily forage for seeds, trekking them tirelessly back and forth into the colony, native plant species are distributed more widely throughout the ants' habitat range.
Important to Scientific Study
Scientific studies of harvester ants, as well as other ant species, reveal many useful insights on the collective behavior of ants within colonies. Ant behavior can correlate to human behavior in working together for the collective good of the species.