Social insects like bees and ants have long impressed scientists with their ability to achieve remarkable feats, such as constructing towering nests and navigating complex environments. But how they manage this, especially with brains smaller than a poppy seed, continues to fascinate researchers. The secret, it turns out, isn’t in the individual — it’s in the group.
A recent study from the Weizmann Institute of Science in Israel took a closer look at how ant colonies use “swarm intelligence” — a type of collective behavior where simple individuals work together to solve complex problems. The team was inspired by something that looked a lot like planning: ants clearing obstacles in advance of incoming food.
“This is the first documented case of ants showing such forward-looking behavior during cooperative transport,” said study co-author Ehud Fonio in a press release.
The paper, published in Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience, adds to the growing body of knowledge diversifying our understanding of intelligence and can teach even human societies about collective problem-solving.
Anticipatory Behavior in the Animal Kingdom
Anticipating future events is often considered a hallmark of higher cognition, seen in mammals, birds, and even in some insects. Ants have long demonstrated intelligent group behaviors, like farming, architecture, even social distancing, but whether they can engage in preplanning wasn’t known.
That changed when researchers spotted something unusual near their lab. Longhorn crazy ants (Paratrechina longicornis) were carrying food back to their nest, but a few were also picking up and removing gravel from the path ahead.
“When we first saw ants clearing small obstacles ahead of the moving load we were in awe,” said study co-author Ofer Feinerman in the news release. “It appeared as if these tiny creatures understand the difficulties that lie ahead and try to help their friends in advance.”
This stood out because most known trail-clearing happens over days and it wasn’t clear what triggered it.
Read More: Ants Do Poop and They Even Use Toilets to Fertilize Their Own Gardens
Observing Swarm Intelligence
To investigate, the team ran 83 experiments with a natural crazy ant supercolony on the Weizmann campus. They placed plastic beads (to simulate gravel) and cat food pellets in a small arena near the nest.
The ants quickly got to work. While some focused on moving the food, others cleared beads from the route to the nest. Some even did so before the food was transported. One determined worker moved 64 beads in a row. This coordination hinted at more than chance, but the real discovery came when the team looked at what triggered it.
Crazy Ants Trigger Behavior
Crazy ants are known for their erratic movement and constant scent-marking. As they walk, they touch their abdomens to the ground every few steps, leaving pheromones that guide others.
In this case, those same trails turned out to be the cue for clearing behavior. Ants didn’t need to see the food or be part of the transport team to start moving beads — just one scent mark near an obstacle triggered the behavior and could put them into “clearing mode.” From there, they continued without further cues. As co-author Danielle Mersch explained, this behavior isn’t driven by individual understanding but emerges from simple interactions — showing how complex outcomes can arise from collective action.
Feinerman added: “Humans think ahead by imagining future events in their minds; ants don’t do that. But by interacting through chemical signals and shared actions, ant colonies can behave in surprisingly smart ways… These ants thus provide us an analogy to brains, where from the activity of relatively simple computational units, namely neurons, some high cognition capabilities miraculously emerge.”
Read More: Do Insects Have Feelings and Consciousness?
Article Sources
Our writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:
Comparative Cognition: Planning Abilities in Nonhuman Animals: In Search of the Evolutionary Origins of “Thought”
Frontiers in Behavioral Neuroscience: Ants engaged in cooperative food transport show anticipatory and nest-oriented clearing of the obstacles surrounding the food: goal-directed behavior emerging from collective cognition
Having worked as a biomedical research assistant in labs across three countries, Jenny excels at translating complex scientific concepts – ranging from medical breakthroughs and pharmacological discoveries to the latest in nutrition – into engaging, accessible content. Her interests extend to topics such as human evolution, psychology, and quirky animal stories. When she’s not immersed in a popular science book, you’ll find her catching waves or cruising around Vancouver Island on her longboard.
