Trophobiosis
A trophobiosis is a relationship between one living being that offers food and a second living being that ingests this food and provides something in return (e.g. protection). Often the food offered is body excretions or the like. A well-known example of trophobiosis is the mutualistic relationship between ants (Formicidae) and aphids (Aphidina), in which the aphids release honeydew and receive protection from the ants. This relationship has also been handed down in fossil form. For example, an inclusion is known from Baltic amber that proves that an ant tricked an aphid around 50 million years ago.
Such a form of coexistence often also exists between ants and plants. The plants then have so-called extra - floral nectaries , which provide nectar to the ants . Here, too, the ants grant the plants protection in return.
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Individual evidence
- ↑ Ants and forest costume. (PDF; 188 kB) (No longer available online.) Bavarian State Institute for Viticulture and Horticulture, October 8, 2009, archived from the original on March 26, 2010 ; Retrieved April 29, 2011 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Wolfgang Weitschat : Hunters, the hunted, parasites and stowaways - snapshots from the amber forest. - In Denisia 26 , Neue Serie 86 , pp. 243-256, 50 figs., Linz 2009
literature
- Bernhard Seifert: Ants: observe, determine. Naturbuch Verlag, Augsburg 1996, ISBN 3-89440-170-2 , pp. 60-63.