2002.01.10 Do ants work all the time and do they ever sleep?

Ants do seem to work very hard, but they also rest and sleep. The reason why you think they are always working is because there are always ants working at every hour. All of the workers look the same, so you might think they are working 24 hours a day. --Ant and UMI

In some ant species sleeping like behavior have been observed e.g. some workers of a colony Australian Carpenter Ants (Camponotus perthiana) laying around in a so-called sleeping position. When they are "awakened", they show a sluggishly moving. --E.O. Wilson

However, this behavior can also be seen as this: As workers have to respond to the colony needs it could also be a reducing of resources. It means that they have nothing to do and have to reduce the need of food, so they fall in a sleep-like idleness with reduced biological functions. When the colony needs them again, they start acting normal with a side effect -- they need time to get to normal functioning (resulting in a sluggish movement). --Jinei

Other comments from my observations from Camponotus. Actually, a friend noticed this watching them on my TV. It seems that at least my carpenters will go into a kind of meditation or relaxed state. One can see their legs waving slightly. Many times a whole chamber will do this for a few minutes at a time until another worker comes in and wakes them up -- or one of them just spontaneously wakes up.

Why this is done? I think in many cases that most ants in a colony are just biding their time -- waiting between feedings or cleaning, etc. They act as a reserve for the colony. I think their "sleep" or "meditation" as I call it, may be important for other reasons than we suspect. I am doing research with someone on this topic and hope to have more soon. It could be to conserve some kind of resource (say food). I personally think this is an unanswered question. Most ants don't sleep for eight hours, then wake up and work all day. It seems their cycle is much shorter -- though when they forage outside they obviously don't do this. --Mr. Ant

Ants hibernate during cold seasons like winter. They survive on the food stores they have gathered in the summer months. This is only in the very coldest months; they will still forage for food most of the winter. The colony will continue to operate, but at a slightly slower speed in colonies quite far under the earth as it is not so cold there, the queen will also produce many less eggs. --Richard Smith