How Many Ants on Earth?

Thousands of scientists have been working to estimate how many ants on earth. The result is staggering. A new study estimates that the world’s ants weigh more than the combined mass of all wild mammals and birds.

In addition to being the planet’s largest insect, ants are also important ecosystem engineers. They help aerate the soil and spread seeds to help grow new plants. They also provide decomposition and pest control. They are found in every environment on Earth. They are abundant in forests, savannahs, deserts, and on every continent except Antarctica.

Researchers in Australia, Hong Kong and Germany have produced a new estimate of the number of ants on earth. They estimate the world’s ant population to be between one and ten quadrillion. This is two to twenty times higher than previous estimates.

The study is important because it provides baseline population figures for ant scientists to track changes in the ant population. This is important because the population has been declining due to habitat destruction and pesticides.

The study found that ants are most abundant in the tropical and subtropical regions of the planet. They also found that the world’s ants are unevenly distributed on the land surface. The study found that two-thirds of ants live in savannahs and tropical forests. The study speculates that the ant distribution patterns are caused by other environmental factors, such as climate change and human land use.

The authors also found that ants are extremely abundant in arid regions. The total biomass of ants is about 20 percent of the biomass of humans.