HACKER Q&A
📣 desertraven

Can an ant colony be trained?


I have a colony of ants that eats anything left around. We have an agreement of kinds - I don't mind them in the house and I try to intermittently bang things around their meal of the day, to warn of an incoming could-be massacre.

They seem to respond well to this, leaving in a scurried beeline the way the came. There are some casualties unfortunately, but relatively little.

Is there some way I can let the colony explicitly know danger is imminent? Perhaps a scent I can place prior to major daily disruptions which would train the colony to retreat upon such an encounter.

What are the environmental inputs to a colony, and can they be trained to recognise these input patterns?


  👤 forgotmypw17 Accepted Answer ✓
What a gift, to share your space and interact with ancient relatives.

Enjoy it, and the little joys it brings.

Each ant has their own personality, see if you can notice that in how they move about.