Leafcutter ants

Janet saw these leaves moving and then we saw them, thousands of leaf cutter ants on the path to Palenque. These guys take the leaf parts to their underground nests where they chew them up, injecting them with fungal spores. The fungi decompose the leaves and are presumably the main food of the ants. So, it's a three-way symbiosis between three Kingdoms, Plantae, Fungi, and Animalia. Pretty amazing. I have some footage of these babies too that I'll put up soon.

 

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