Why is the 29-year queen record doubtful?

The note’s dates add up to about 18¾ years

What is Myrmecophilus acervorum?

An ant cricket that lives in ant nests

Black Garden Ant

Q: How to identify Black Garden Ant?

Compare the antennae, waist segments, body proportions and size. Workers, queens and males of the same species can look surprisingly different. Ant Identifier: upload a photo and compare the visible details.

Q: What does Black Garden Ant eat?

These ants are omnivores, eating both sugary treats and protein-rich snacks.

Q: When is flying ant day?

There isn’t just one. In the UK, black garden ants fly on warm, calm afternoons from June to September, with 97% of sightings in July and August. Flights need temperatures above 13 °C and light winds, so different towns and even neighbouring gardens can have their flights on different days.

Q: Do black garden ants sting or bite?

They cannot sting: their group of ants lost the sting and sprays acid from the tip of the rear body instead. They do have small jaws for grabbing food, but they are no danger to people. Watch them rather than picking them up, and ask an adult if ants come indoors.

Q: How long does a black garden ant queen live?

Queens can live 20 years or more in captivity, far longer than workers. The often-quoted 28¾-year record is shaky: the dates in the original note (1931 to 1950) add up to about 18¾ years.

Q: Why do ants farm aphids?

Aphids release sugary honeydew, a rich energy food for the colony. In return, the ants guard the aphids from ladybirds and other enemies, and their chemicals keep the aphids from wandering away.

Q: How many ants are in a black garden ant colony?

A single queen and from several hundred up to about 10,000 workers. One source says colonies normally have 4,000–7,000 workers and rarely 40,000.

Q: What happens to flying ants after they mate?

Males live only a day or two. A mated queen snaps off her wings, seals herself in a small chamber underground and raises her first workers alone, living off her wing muscles until they appear 8–10 weeks later.

Q: Why do ants walk in a line?

They are following a scent trail (pheromone) laid by nestmates returning from food. The better the food, the more scent they lay, and following trails is built in.

Q: Is the black garden ant endangered?

No. It has not been assessed by the IUCN Red List, but it is very common across Europe and parts of Asia and thrives in towns. The southern wood ant, a relative, is listed as Near Threatened.

Lasius niger

The black garden ant (Lasius niger) is a small, dark brown to blackish ant found from Portugal to Japan, and common in gardens, parks and towns; in Britain it is the ant people know best. Each colony has a single queen and up to about 10,000 workers, often nesting under sun-warmed paving slabs and stones. It farms aphids for their sugary honeydew, guides nestmates with scent trails, and on warm summer afternoons sends out swarms of winged queens and males.

Also known as Common black garden ant, Common Black Ant, Garden Ant

Black garden ant abilities

97% of UK sightings in July–August
On warm, still summer afternoons, winged queens and males pour out of nests to mate in the air.
- A citizen-science survey collected over 13,000 sightings across the UK in three years; 88.5% of the winged ants were black garden ants.
- Flights only happened above 13 °C and in winds below 6.3 m/s. Every day with an average above 25 °C had ants flying somewhere.
- Nests in towns and next to heat-storing walls and paving sent out winged ants earlier.
- There is no single flying ant day: neighbouring gardens can see flights weeks apart, depending on local weather.
Sources [11, 12]
+3 °C warmer = more honeydew collected
Black garden ants “milk” aphids for sweet honeydew and guard them like a herd.
- Ants drink the honeydew aphids release and protect them from predators such as ladybirds.
- Ant chemicals slow wingless aphids down, and ants can stop winged aphids from flying off by removing wings and changing how wings develop.
- In the lab, a 3 °C warmer day (23 instead of 20 °C) brought out more ants and more honeydew was collected.
- City ants in Berlin defended their aphids more aggressively than country ants.
- It is a deal, not a friendship: depending on what each side offers, ants and aphids can be partners or predator and prey.
Sources [10, 13, 14, 15, 16]
≈10 tries to learn to ignore a bad trail
A forager that finds food lays an invisible scent trail home, and nestmates follow it.
- Ants lay trail scent (pheromone) on the way back to the nest. The better the food, the more scent they lay.
- They lay more scent to food that is not already crowded, which spreads the workers out.
- Following trails is built in: ants learned in about 10 tries to stop trusting a bad trail, but could not learn to avoid it.
- In dim light, they lay more scent and lean on trails more.
Sources [1, 2, 3, 17]
pH ≈ 2 crop acidity in a formicine cousin
Food is carried home in the crop, a shared stomach, and passed mouth to mouth to nestmates.
- The crop sits in the rear body. Social insects store food there and exchange it.
- Formicine ants swallow their own acid. In carpenter ants this kept the crop at about pH 2 and helped stop germs in food.
- Black garden ant foragers often head home before the crop is full, which keeps trips short.
Sources [6, 7]
0 stings
Instead of a sting, black garden ants have an acid-spraying tip on their rear body.
- Formicine ants lost the sting. They spray venom from the acidopore, a small opening at the tip of the rear body.
- The venom is acidic and can contain formic acid. Formicine ants also groom the opening and swallow some acid to keep their food clean.
- About 71% of ant species sting, but not this one, so it is no danger to people.
Sources [5, 6]
8–10 wks egg to first workers
After her flight, a new queen seals herself underground and raises her first workers alone.
- She snaps off her wings, digs a small chamber and closes the entrance.
- She does not eat. Her body breaks down her now-useless wing muscles for food, and she can lose about half her weight.
- Her eggs take about 8–10 weeks to become the first, small workers, who then open the nest and start foraging.
- Heavier queens raised more young before their first winter.
Sources [8, 18]
2018 first proof, in this ant
When disease gets into the colony, the ants change who meets whom, which slows the spread.
- Scientists used automated tracking to follow the ants in lab colonies, then exposed some workers to a germ that makes ants ill.
- Both the exposed ants and their healthy nestmates changed their behaviour.
- The changes strengthened the colony’s built-in “firebreaks”, protecting key members such as the queen.
- It was the first experimental evidence that an animal society reshapes its contact network when germs appear.
Sources [8, 19]
Earlier flights near heat-storing structures
Black garden ants love to nest under things the sun warms, such as paving slabs and stones.
- A slab soaks up sunshine and warms the nest beneath it. Nests turn up under almost anything the sun heats.
- Nests in towns and by heat-storing structures produced winged ants earlier in the summer.
- Ants are most active in gardens from April to October.
Sources [4, 11, 13]

Tap a pin on the model or a part below.

≈10 tries to learn to ignore a bad trail
- Two elbowed antennae sweep the ground as the ant walks. Ants follow scent trails laid by their nestmates, and they do it by instinct.
- In a lab maze, black garden ants learned after about 10 tries to stop trusting a trail that led to something nasty, but they never learned to steer away from it.
- Ants also tell food apart by smell: scientists train them to link a scent with a sugar reward.
Sources [1, 2]
Day + night active in both
- Black garden ants are active by day and by night. Foragers remember routes by sight as well as by smell.
- In dim light, when landmarks are hard to see, they lay more trail scent and rely on it more.
Sources [3]
Small prey and scavenged food
- The jaws (mandibles) grab and carry food. Workers scavenge and catch small invertebrates as well as drinking sweet liquids.
- They are bold and will attack other ants that come too close.
- They are no danger to people: a worker cannot sting.
Sources [4, 5]
Part-full foragers head home early
- Liquid food goes into the crop, a stretchy “social stomach” in the rear body. Ants store food there and share it with nestmates mouth to mouth.
- A forager does not wait until its crop is full before heading home to recruit help. Going back part-full makes trips shorter and spreads news faster.
- Ants in its subfamily swallow their own acid, which keeps the crop acidic and helps kill germs in shared food.
Sources [6, 7]
0 stings
- Black garden ants belong to the Formicinae, a group of ants that has no working sting. Instead they spray venom from a gland at the tip of the rear body.
- The opening is called the acidopore. The spray is acidic and can contain formic acid.
- Worldwide, about 71% of ant species can sting. This one is not among them.
Sources [5, 6]
≈50% of her weight a founding queen loses
- The middle body section carries the six legs and, in queens and males, the wings. A thin waist links it to the rear body.
- A new queen does not eat while she raises her first workers. Her body breaks down her wing muscles for food, and she can lose about half her weight.
- Young queens sometimes start a nest together, but usually only one survives.
Sources [8, 9]
+3 °C warmer = faster foragers (lab)
- Six legs carry foragers boldly across paths, patios and bare ground.
- In a lab test, a 3 °C rise in temperature (from 20 to 23 °C) made foragers walk faster and brought more of them out to the aphids.
- Workers sometimes build little tunnels of soil over their trails and over plant stems where aphids feed.
Sources [4, 10]
> 13 °C needed for flights
- Only young queens and males have wings. Workers never do.
- After mating, a queen snaps off her wings. Males live only a day or two after the flight.
- In a UK survey, winged ants were only seen when it was warmer than 13 °C and the wind was below 6.3 m/s.
Sources [8, 11, 12]
10,000 workers, at most
- Nests are often under stones, paving slabs, wood, plastic or metal: anything the sun warms up. Sometimes they build soft soil mounds.
- In lawns, a nest shows up as small heaps of fine soil.
- A colony has from several hundred up to about 10,000 workers.
Sources [4, 13]
Honeydew sugar from aphids
- Aphids suck plant sap and release sugary honeydew. The ants collect it and in return guard the aphids from ladybirds and other enemies.
- Ant chemicals make wingless aphids walk more slowly, so the herd stays put.
- In Berlin, ants in the city defended their aphids more fiercely than ants outside it.
Sources [13, 14, 15]

Real black garden ants

Photos from Wikimedia Commons. Four of them can change the 3D model.

WorkerSmall, wingless and dark brown to blackish. Every worker is a female that does not lay eggs.Forages, farms aphids, digs, guards and cares for the youngA worker in Søborg, Denmark. Photo: Donald Hobern from Copenhagen, Denmark, CC BY 2.0
Workers tending their aphid herdPhoto: ImagePerson, CC BY 4.0
Collecting honeydew in Hertfordshire, England, in JulyPhoto: anemoneprojectors, CC BY-SA 2.0
QueenNoticeably larger than a worker. She starts adult life with wings and snaps them off after mating.One per colony; lays all the eggsA queen with her eggs and cocoons. Photo: Eveha, CC BY-SA 4.0
MaleWinged, and raised only for the summer mating flight.Mates, then lives only a day or twoA winged male, Frankfurt am Main, Germany. Photo: Fritz Geller-Grimm, CC BY-SA 3.0
BroodTiny white eggs, pale grub-like larvae and cocoons (pupae). Larvae moult about three times before spinning a cocoon.Fed and carried around by nurse workersWorkers caring for cocoons (pupae). Photo: ImagePerson, CC BY 4.0
Sharing food mouth to mouth on an irisPhoto: Python (Peter Rühr), CC BY 3.0
An older worker feeds a newly emerged one, in a young captive colonyPhoto: Vincnet41, CC BY-SA 4.0
A young colony: queen, workers and broodPhoto: Jason Berger, CC BY-SA 4.0

Black garden ant by the numbers

Measured by scientists and recording societies, with the doubtful ones flagged.

Queen lifespan (record): 28¾ years?; one captive queen, 1931–1950; those dates add up to about 18¾ years⁠[20]; Reported black garden ant queen28.75 yearsMedian maximum, 9 well-documented ant species7.9 years
Workers per colony: up to 10,000; from several hundred; one source says rare colonies reach 40,000⁠[4, 8]
Queens per colony: 1; co-founding queens usually end up with one survivor⁠[4, 9]
Flight season: 97%; of UK winged-ant sightings were in July and August⁠[11]
Flight temperature: > 13 °C; no winged ants seen in colder weather⁠[11]
Flight wind limit: < 6.3 m/s; about 23 km/h; windier days had no flights⁠[11]
Survey sightings: 13,000+; 88.5% of the winged ants sampled were black garden ants⁠[11]
Egg to worker: 8–10 weeks; for a new queen’s first brood⁠[8]
Stings: 0; it sprays acid instead; about 71% of ant species do sting⁠[5]
Range: Portugal → Japan; and from North Africa to Finland⁠[4]

Black garden ant myths and facts

Tap Myth or Fact for each claim, then check the answer.

0 of 8 answered

“There is one “flying ant day” each summer.”
“Flying ants are a different kind of ant.”
“Black garden ants can sting you.”
“A black garden ant queen lived for 29 years.”
“Black garden ants farm aphids.”
“All worker ants are female.”
“Ants change how they behave when disease gets into the nest.”
“Some crickets live inside ant nests.”

Black garden ant records

Superlatives and record claims, each checked against its source.

Most famous ant age record
28¾ years (claimed)
A captive black garden ant queen
Cited again and again in science books, but the original note’s dates (August 1931 to April 1950) give about 18¾ years.⁠[20]
Biggest flying ant survey
13,000+ sightings
UK Flying Ant Survey
The largest dataset ever gathered on winged ant flights, collected by the public over three years.⁠[11, 12]
The UK’s top flying ant
88.5%
Black garden ant
Share of the winged ants sampled in the survey that were black garden ants.⁠[11]
First proof of disease-triggered “social distancing”
2018
Black garden ant colonies
The first experimental evidence that an animal society changes its contact network when a disease appears.⁠[19]

A year in a black garden ant colony

From waking up in spring to the summer flight and the long winter rest.

April
Waking up
As the soil warms, workers come back out to forage. Ants are most active in gardens from April to October.⁠[13]
Spring–summer
Farming season
Workers scout for food, lay scent trails and set up aphid herds on garden plants.⁠[4, 17]
July–August
Flight days
On warm, calm afternoons (above 13 °C), winged queens and males leave the nest. Town nests tend to go first.⁠[11, 4]
Flight day
Wings off
Mated queens land and snap off their wings. The males live only a day or two more.⁠[8]
Late summer
A queen alone
Each new queen seals herself in a small chamber and lays eggs, living off her wing muscles.⁠[8]
8–10 weeks later
First workers
Her first, small workers appear, open the nest and start fetching food.⁠[8, 21]
Winter
Rest underground
The colony hibernates in the soil. Even a brand-new queen and her first workers spend their first winter resting underground. Queens that started heavier go into winter with more young.⁠[18, 23]
Years later
Ready to fly
Only after several years is a colony big enough to raise its own queens and males.⁠[8]

Black garden ant vs red ant vs wood ant

Three common European ants, three very different lifestyles.

Black garden ant (Lasius niger) vs red ant (Myrmica rubra) vs southern wood ant (Formica rufa)
	Black garden ant	Red ant (Myrmica rubra)	Southern wood ant (Formica rufa)
Defence⁠[4, 24, 5]	Sprays acid, no sting	Stings freely	Sprays acid, no sting
Queens per colony⁠[4, 24, 25]	1	Many (about 15 on average)	Usually 1 (in Britain)
Workers⁠[4, 24]	Several hundred to 10,000	1,000 or more	Not given in our sources
Nest⁠[4, 24, 25]	Under paving, stones, wood; sometimes soft mounds	In soil, grass tufts, under stones, rotten wood	Single, separate mounds in woods and scrub
Flying season (Britain)⁠[4, 24]	Early July to mid August	August and September	Not given in our sources
Sweet food⁠[4, 24]	Aphid honeydew	Honeydew and nectar	Not covered here
IUCN Red List⁠[26]	Not evaluated	Not evaluated	Near Threatened

The southern wood ant starts new colonies by taking over nests of other Formica ants for a while.

Is the black garden ant endangered?

No. It is one of the most common ants in Europe and does well in towns and gardens.

IUCN Red List

Not Evaluated (NE)

Trend unknown

Not scarce or threatened in Britain, and widespread from Portugal to Japan. Its close relative, the southern wood ant, is listed as Near Threatened.⁠[27, 26, 4]

Not assessed by the IUCN Red List (checked October 2026).

Threats

Insecticides64 weeks
In a 64-week lab study, a low dose of a neonicotinoid insecticide made workers lighter, though queens were not affected.⁠[28]
Polluted soil
Scientists are testing how brake dust, soot, microplastics and manure in soil affect new queens starting colonies.⁠[29]

What’s helping

Wildlife-friendly gardens
Ants are predators of other small animals and part of a healthy garden. Leaving wild corners helps them and lots of other wildlife.⁠[13]
Citizen science
Thousands of people sent in sightings of flying ants, which revealed how weather triggers mating flights.⁠[11, 12]

Related ants

Southern wood ant (Formica rufa)Near Threatened
Builds mound nests. In Britain, isolated colonies can be wiped out by poor summers and damage to nests.⁠[26, 25]

Black garden ant quiz

12 questions. Every answer is somewhere on this page.

Question 1 of 12Score 0

Who are the “flying ants” you see in summer?

Black Garden Ant field notes

Diet, food web, safety and badges from the Snappit field guide.

Diet & Feeding

These ants are omnivores, eating both sugary treats and protein-rich snacks.

Primary Foods

Honeydew
Nectar
Dead insects
Seeds
Fruit
Foraging Method: Foraging

Ecological connections

Black Bean AphidSymbiotic with
Protects aphids for their sweet honeydew.
House SparrowEaten by
Can be a food source for various birds.
European Garden SpiderEaten by
Frequently caught in spiderwebs.

Safety

Danger 1/5 · Very low

Do not touch or pick up. This ant cannot sting, so just watch it. Ask an adult if ants come indoors.

Traits

Collections

Classification

Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Formicidae
Genus: Lasius

Sources for these black garden ant facts

29 studies and references · checked Oct 16, 2026

Frequently Asked Questions

How to identify Black Garden Ant?

Compare the antennae, waist segments, body proportions and size. Workers, queens and males of the same species can look surprisingly different. Ant Identifier: upload a photo and compare the visible details.

How big is Black Garden Ant?

3-9 mm

How long does Black Garden Ant live?

60-5475 days

What does Black Garden Ant eat?

These ants are omnivores, eating both sugary treats and protein-rich snacks.

Where is Black Garden Ant usually found?

Gardens and parks

How many legs does Black Garden Ant have?

How large are Black Garden Ant colonies?

10000

When is flying ant day?

There isn’t just one. In the UK, black garden ants fly on warm, calm afternoons from June to September, with 97% of sightings in July and August. Flights need temperatures above 13 °C and light winds, so different towns and even neighbouring gardens can have their flights on different days.

Do black garden ants sting or bite?

They cannot sting: their group of ants lost the sting and sprays acid from the tip of the rear body instead. They do have small jaws for grabbing food, but they are no danger to people. Watch them rather than picking them up, and ask an adult if ants come indoors.

How long does a black garden ant queen live?

Queens can live 20 years or more in captivity, far longer than workers. The often-quoted 28¾-year record is shaky: the dates in the original note (1931 to 1950) add up to about 18¾ years.

Why do ants farm aphids?

Aphids release sugary honeydew, a rich energy food for the colony. In return, the ants guard the aphids from ladybirds and other enemies, and their chemicals keep the aphids from wandering away.

How many ants are in a black garden ant colony?

A single queen and from several hundred up to about 10,000 workers. One source says colonies normally have 4,000–7,000 workers and rarely 40,000.

What happens to flying ants after they mate?

Males live only a day or two. A mated queen snaps off her wings, seals herself in a small chamber underground and raises her first workers alone, living off her wing muscles until they appear 8–10 weeks later.

Why do ants walk in a line?

They are following a scent trail (pheromone) laid by nestmates returning from food. The better the food, the more scent they lay, and following trails is built in.

Is the black garden ant endangered?

No. It has not been assessed by the IUCN Red List, but it is very common across Europe and parts of Asia and thrives in towns. The southern wood ant, a relative, is listed as Near Threatened.

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