What Eats Ants? What Do Ants Eat?
Ants are near the bottom of the food chain and near the outside of the food web, so there are lots of animals that like to eat them.
In the world’s tropical regions, some mammals specialize in eating ants. Many of
these animals are actually called anteaters, and they have long, skinny tongues with which to pull ants into their mouths.
Many frogs, arachnids, or 8-legged predators, feathered predators, serpents and other reptiles also like to eat ants. And any ant that falls into a stream, river or pond is likely to get eaten by a fish.
Some people even eat ants. One kind of ant that lives in the Amazon rainforest tastes like a lemon drop, and the children who live there eat as many of these ants as they can get!
And . . . what do ants eat? Ants eat almost anything, from other insects to decaying animal flesh to fungi (funguses) that they grow themselves in their own underground gardens!
