Pharaoh ant site. Pharaoh ant colonies appear to prefer familiar nests to novel nests while budding. This suggests the ability for colonies to remember certain qualities of their living space. However, if the novel (unfamiliar) nest is of superior quality, the colony may initially move toward the familiar, but will eventually select the unfamiliar. The colony assumes the familiar nest is preferable, unless they sense better qualities in the novel nest. This decision-making process seeks to minimize the time the colony is without a nest while optimizing the nest the colony finally chooses. The number of available budding locations has a large
Ant mimicry call of ants so they can integrate themselves into the nest. In "A. dentatis" the tubercles release the mimicking pheromone which elicits "A. caprensis" to care for the mimics as they would their own brood. In these relationships worker ants give the same preference to the Lycaenid's as they do to their own brood, demonstrating that chemical signals produced by the mimic are indistinguishable to the ant. This process is also used by larvae of the European Lycaenid species "Phengaris rebeli" which live in the nests of "Myrmica" ants and feed on their ant brood. Wasmannian mimicry occurs when two