Three of the 11 attine species had abundant Pseudonocardia, including two Acromyrmex leaf-cutting ants. Five other species ...

The 210 species of attine ants, including the 47 species of leafcutters, forage through the forests of Central and South America in search of leaves and other vegetation, which they carve into ...

Attine ants—those fungus farmers—vary in how dependent their funky crops are on the colonies that cultivate them. Some fungi can escape back into the wild and grow on their own.

The attine ants are a group of more than 200 species that use several different agricultural techniques to cultivate mutualistic fungi which they raise in funugs gardens.

It cultivates a highly domesticated fungus that’s much younger than itself and only originated in the gardens of higher-attine leaf-cutter ants less than 10 million years ago.

A new study led by the Smithsonian Institution and the University of Copenhagen found that a species of ants in South America known as attine were cultivating fungi 55 to 60 million years ago, ...

Leaf-cutter ants, also known as attine ants, eat fungus that they cultivate in gardens by gathering vegetation to feed the fungus. “We think we invented farming 10,000 years ago.

The attine ants of South America rely on fungus farming to support their diminutive communities. They may never be able to compete with the dizzying array of crops humans grow, but they’ve been ...

Ant antennae also produced an electrical response to both chemicals. Upon probing the dirt’s bacterial content, favored soil was enriched in actinobacteria compared to the non-favored soil.