Texas plagued by millions-strong swarms of electricity-obsessed ‘crazy ants’ in 23 counties that chew up phones and TVs – and South Carolina may be next
December 7, 2016 in News by RBN
Texas is no stranger to vicious insects, but even the despised fire ant can’t compare with a menace that is testing the patience of those in the Lone Star state: the tawny crazy ant.
That’s not a nickname. The insects are so bizarre in their behavior – which includes erratic movement and swarming over and inside electronics, then chomping them up – that they’ve earned the title of ‘crazy ant’.
This year they’ve been driving Texans in 23 counties wild with their outrageously huge armies, myStatesman reported.
The tawny crazy ant – also called the Rasberry crazy ant after Texas exterminator Tom Rasberry, who first logged them in 2002 – looks like a smaller, more fragile version of its cousin, the fire ant.
It earned its name because of the way it zig-zags around, apparently at random – but their armies, which number in the millions, are better known – and hated – for destroying electrical equipment.
They also kill ground-nesting animals and are a danger to poultry, livestock and agriculture, according to Professor Eric Benson of Clemson University in South Carolina.
‘They’re called crazy ants because they run around like they’re crazy, like they don’t know what they’re doing,’ he said in July. ‘But they do know what they’re doing, and they are highly efficient foragers.’
And, the university says, they may come to South Carolina next.
On the march: Armies of crazy ants can number in the millions, as up to 100 queens can live in one nest. The ants are known for entering electronics, chewing them up and destroying them
In July, he said: ‘The predictive models show that the tawny crazy ant could become established in South Carolina in 2016, especially along the coastal counties from Jasper up to Georgetown.’
Crazy ants haven’t yet been found in the state – to the surprise of some at the university – but a spokesman from the university said that at present it still looks like a question of ‘when’ they arrive, not ‘if’.
He also suggested that given the size of the state, the ants could already have entered somewhere, and remained undetected by humans.
For most people, the crazy ants’ obsession with electronics is the biggest problem.
Roaming ants are attracted to electrical currents – either by magnetic fields, or the warmth they generate – and will chew through insulation and cables to get to the copper wires.
Upon being shocked, the ants then release a danger pheromone that attracts more of their number, who search for enemies.
