Ants drinking maple syrup (pics)

[Ecooper]

Not too much of a story here...I put a drop of maple syrup out in the garden to try and coax ants to stop for a taste and pose for some photos for my blog. This was my favourite.

Unfortunately I have no idea what species they are...

Olympus OM-D E-M5, Zuiko 35mm macro, Olympus FL-36 flash, F11 @ 1/200 sec, ISO: 200


Cheers,
EC
www.macrocritters.wordpress.com


P6170318 ant and drop 2 by ernie.cooper, on Flickr

 

[NateS]

Very nice. I've used honey before, but not maple syrup. Good thinking.

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[Ecooper]

Very nice. I've used honey before, but not maple syrup. Good thinking.

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Well, these were Canadian ants after all!

 

[cgipson1]

Nice... good idea!

 

[Photographiend]

Ooooh... cool Idea. Nice pic.

 

[greybeard]

I like

 

[ShooterJ]

Nice shot!

 

[TATTRAT]

Brilliant!

 

[ronlane]

Interesting, I like it.

 

[Dmariehill]

Great pic

From a little quick research. It looks like a member of the Formica, part of the rufa group. They're apparently hard to differentiate. The black head is throwing me a bit. I'm seeing common names of allegheny mound ant, thatching ant, confield ant and pharoh ant. All of these look pretty much the same, smooth (no hair) black gaster, red thorax. I've seen a few pics with the ones with black heads along side these with red/orange heads.