🚨 ARTHROPOD OF THE DAY 🚨

Dinoponera quadriceps (dinosaur ants) are a little primitive, as their name suggests. They’re bigger than normal ants, over 2.5 centimeters (1 in) long, and everyone in the colony has the ability to reproduce. Instead of a queen, they have an alpha female. She’s surrounded by up to five beta females, who do nothing but sit around all day long. These betas are next in line if something should happen to the alpha.

Sometimes a beta gets tired of waiting and decides to start laying eggs of her own. If the alpha female detects that her position is being challenged, she wipes chemicals from her stinger onto the would-be usurper. At that point, the workers will run out to punish the offending ant. They will pin the overreaching beta to the ground, sometimes for up to four days. After justice has been meted out, the beta also loses her rank and is just a lowly worker from then on, or she’s dead from not eating for four days. Dinosaur ants put traitors to the rack.