Are Ants Attracted To Honey? (Everything You Need To Know)

So you want to find out if ants are attracted to honey or not? You’ve come to the right place as everything you need to know about this question will be answered and I’ll also give answers to closely related questions that you might have once I’ve given you the answer to the main question. Let’s get right to the answer first.

Are ants attracted to honey? They are attracted to honey once the outer layer of the pure honey is diluted which will happen once the pure honey absorbs moisture from the air. They won’t be attracted to pure honey that’s not diluted because if ants decide to eat this honey they will get stuck to it.

Why is it that ants get stuck to pure honey that’s not diluted?

The moisture content of pure honey is about 20% which needs to be higher if ants want to eat the pure honey and don’t want to get stuck to the honey. So once the outer layer of the pure honey is diluted, the moisture content percentage will increase and will therefore become edible for ants.

They will not be attracted to the honey until the moisture content percentage of the honey has increased because of them potentially getting stuck.

To what kind of honey are ants attracted?

Ants are attracted to honey that has a high moisture content percentage. This kind of honey is not sticky, is almost watery, and has more scent molecules which can be picked up more easily by ants through smell.

So, make sure you close off the honey you’re eating yourself as ants will be attracted to it.

Why are ants attracted to honey?

Ants are attracted to honey because honey contains sugar and sugar is a source of energy that is easily digestible. They don’t only go after sugary foods though, they will go after any food that provides them with protein or carbohydrates.

So, you can expect ants to go after every kind of food as long as the foods enable the ant to survive.

What do ants do with the honey they find?

Once the ants find honey when they’ve, for example, infiltrated a beehive, the ants will start collecting the honey and then will walk back with the honey from the beehive to the ant’s nest. Ants leave a trail of pheromones which can be used to find their way back to their nest.

Once they’ve successfully managed to bring their first collected package of honey back to their nest, they’ll take that same trail back to the beehive, and repeat the process until all the resources are collected.

Are there alternative situations where the ants will not be attracted to honey?

If the honey is still pure honey with a moisture content percentage of 20% then they are not attracted to this honey yet because the honey doesn’t give off enough scent molecules for the ants to pick up.

And if they happen to still find it then eating it will not be a pleasant experience for the ants as this honey is very sticky and they will probably get stuck in it.

Does original honey attract, ants?

Original honey which is also called pure honey and is, for example, made by bees can attract ants. However, pure honey has a moisture content percentage of about 20% which is not enough of a percentage of moisture content to make ants attracted to the honey.

Once the outer layer of the honey is diluted, the ants can smell the honey better because the honey will then consist of more scent molecules.

Are there ants that can produce honey themselves?

Ants don’t produce honey like bees do but they do collect what is called “simple sugar fluids”. They do this by collecting nectar and once the nectar is collected, they use special ant workers within their colony called “honeypot ants” to store and maintain the simple sugar fluids.

Besides collecting nectar from flowers, they also sap honeydew from hemipteran sap-suckers, and also from extrafloral nectaries.

What is a honeypot ant?

Honeypot ants are specialized workers within a colony that can hold a lot of food in their abdomen which makes their abdomen swell enormously. These kinds of ants can be seen as living storages within an ant colony.

Once the food supply within a colony gets scarce then the food storage that is maintained within the abdomen of the honeypot ants can be used by the honeypot ant’s fellow ants. The liquid that is stored within the abdomen of the honeypot ant can be accessed by the ants in the colony by stroking the antenna of the honeypot ant which will cause the stored liquid to regurgitate from its crop.

Check out the video below if you want to know what a honeypot ant looks like when food is stored in its abdomen.

What are the facts about honeypot ants?

There are a bunch of different facts about the honeypot ants that are good to know. Let’s name them right here:

They are 0.4-inches to 0.5-inches.
They eat flower nectar, other plant fluids that contain high amounts of sugar, honeydew from aphids, other insects, dead insects, and also different invertebrates.
They are dark red-colored.
They are native to the deserts of Africa, North America, and Australia.
The abdomen of the honeypot ant is used as liquid storage within the colony.
If the colony is in a scarcity of food then they can count on the storages of the honeypot ants.
They are the “gold pieces” of the colony so to say, so if a predator invades the nest it will surely go after the honeypot ants as these ants will be the predator’s best food source.
Once the liquids in the honeypot ant’s abdomen are retrieved, the honeypot ant will die as its abdomen cannot return to its normal size.

They are pretty impressive insects if you’d ask me.

Where can honeypot ants be found?

Honeypot ants can be found in the deserts of North America, Australia, and Africa. In particular, you’ll find the honeypot ants in the deserts of Arizona and New Mexico. It’s not common to run into colonies though as they will be hidden away quite nicely.

Before researching this topic, I did not know that honeypot ants existed and I was very surprised by their capabilities.

Will ants always go for honey when they get the choice?

If the ant is put in front of an arsenal of different sugar-containing foods then you can’t always know which exact piece of food it will go for. But it’s important to remember that they will be very attracted to foods with a sugary scent.

Take, for example, honey that has already absorbed much moisture from the air and has therefore become easy to eat. You can’t be sure that it will be the first choice of the ants but they will certainly not leave it either.

If you can’t get enough of learning about insects then I encourage you to check out the “Insects Category Page” which consists of various articles that give answers to insect-related questions.

What does honey do to ants?

Honey won’t do anything special to the ants. They will be attracted to it once they can smell it though but that would be the case for every sugar-containing food. So, it wouldn’t make honey anything special to them.

You can be sure though that they will go after honey even if that means losing some members of their colony. They’ll, for example, attack beehives if they scent the honey that’s stored within.

Can you feed ants with honey?

You can feed ants with honey and they will thank you for it as it gives them a larger chance to survive tougher days to come because they’ll have better-filled reserves thanks to you. You can also give them other foods that consist of proteins or carbohydrates.

Make sure though that you don’t lure them to your house with food as they’ll be crawling all-around your house then.

Can we eat the simple sugar fluids that are stored by ants?

Human beings can eat the simple sugar fluids that are stored in the abdomen of the honeypot ants but you shouldn’t expect any familiar tastes. The simple sugar fluids that are being stored by the honeypot ants will not taste like the honey you’re used to.

I haven’t tasted simple sugar fluids from ants before but I’d imagine that it will probably taste quite strange.

Does pure organic honey attract, ants?

To ants, it doesn’t make any difference if the honey is either organic or not. They will just go for it because it contains sugars that they can use to give both themselves and their colony a better chance of survival.

So, you should always seal off the honey your holding in your home as ants can smell it otherwise.

Do ants attract pure honey?

Honey won’t be attracted to ants neither will it be attracted to anything. The other way around though, ants are surely attracted to honey and will do anything to find it once they smell a honey scent.

It does make sense that honey won’t be attracted to anything as it’s not a living organism.

Is raw honey good for ants?

In general, raw honey shouldn’t be a problem for the ants to eat if they happen to find it in, for example, a beehive that isn’t maintained by a beekeeper because beekeepers put special powders within the raw honey that is poisonous to ants.

Once the raw honey that contains the powder is processed though, it won’t be a problem anymore for the ants to eat it.

Do ants prefer honey or sugar?

In general, ants will be more attracted to sugary-containing foods that have, for example, been weakened by the addition of water (like honey) as the ants will then have an easier time capturing the sugars out of the food in question.

But you can be sure though, that they wouldn’t leave any random laying sugar lumps alone just because they are not weakened by the addition of water.

Does the type of honey you give to ants matter?

In general, it doesn’t matter what type of honey you give to ants but you should know though that you shouldn’t give raw honey to your potential pet ants as raw honey can still contain special powders that are put into the honey to keep ants away from it.

If the ants still happen to eat the raw honey with the powder in it then they will die because of the poisonous effect the powder will have on them.

Can honey kill ants?

In general, honey won’t be able to kill ants but there can be cases where it might kill an ant or two. This can happen when the honey is still pure and contains a moisture content percentage of about 20% which the ants will stick to and then potentially die from.

But most of the time honey will extend the lifetime of ants instead of shortening it.

How to keep ants away from honey?

There are different things you can implement to make sure you’ll keep ants away. You should, for example, make sure that the ants can’t smell the honey, you should clean everything after having used the honey, and you should store the honey in your refrigerator.

All in all, these tips are very easy to implement but could mean the difference between a house full of ants or a house without ants.

How do I get rid of ants with honey?

Honey is sometimes also used to get rid of ants by mixing it with borax which is often lethal and poisonous to ants. So, once they find the honey, they will start eating it and later they will die of the poisoning.

Now you might be thinking why borax is used as I was asking myself the same question. Borax is a slow-killing poison that allows the ants to survive until they’ve walked back to their nests with the deadly honey in their mouths. Once they arrive back at the nest, they will start to die and will infest the whole nest with this poison which is exactly where humans intended it for.

Is honey poisonous to ants?

Honey on itself is not poisonous to ants but mixing honey with, for example, borax will indeed make it poisonous to ants. Mixing honey with borax is often used to get rid of ant colonies that become annoying to people.

In general, though, they’ll love honey and will do anything to get it.

Conclusion

Now you know that ants are indeed attracted to honey and that they will be even more attracted to it once the honey is a bit more diluted which is achieved by mixing it with water or by letting the honey sit in an environment with high humidity levels.