Ants wont die from being dropped from any height, their weight to surface area is so low that the ant will never hit a velocity that is terminal, so my question is why they won’t just jump from heights to reach certain points faster? Are they scared of heights?
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Ants leave and follow chemical trails. They don’t operate as individuals. An ant that jumps to create a ‘shortcut’ is not leaving a trail for other ants to follow, meaning the jumping ant is the only one that got the shortcut and now it has no trail to follow.
They will, this happened in my front porch a couple weeks ago. An ant was carrying a dead fly (very impressive to see), and it yeeted the fly off of a step and then just jumped off to grab it and keep moving it.
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To correct the terminology used in the post, the ants will hit a velocity that’s terminal (terminal velocity), but their terminal velocity is so low they won’t suffer damage.
There are actually **are** ants that do exactly this! [Jack Jumper Ant](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_jumper_ant)
Why would you, as a blind ass tiny ass bloke in a huge ass environment, just randomly jump to somewhere?
Top comment says you lose the pheromone scent, but you really have no idea how far you will be jumping down. You could fall 10m or 100m, and sure, you survive that, but *then what*? You will be displaced a huge amount of distance relative to where you used to be and how are you supposed to find your way?
I just feel like randomly yeeting yourself off an unknown height into an unknown environment is not really the best strategy for navigation.
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Ants aren’t on a one way trip, they take round trips so the path there needs to work as path back home as well. Jumping off something won’t work on the way back.
I can still fall and break my arm without hitting terminal velocity lol. Just because I won’t immediately die when I jump off of something doesn’t mean it’s safe.
I am dealing with a carpenter ant infestation right now and I can tell you that they do jump and they do die from falling, or at least get seriously injured from it- to the point they no longer move. It’s precisely how I figured out the source- which is about 18’ high from the floor in my living room. They are in a void between an addition. Some started to be push out… most survive the fall but some do not. I have witnessed them roaming around on a beam, then fall/jump, and the death. I’ve been standing on a ladder eye to eye with them and watch it happen several times in the last few days as I’ve been baiting them.
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