Something like ten thousand trillion ants control vast stretches of territory. Their success lies in cooperation. They are a social insect, living in often enormous colonies, coordinating their activities to an exceptional degree to achieve domination. These are aggressive and capable critters, ones whose existence is characterized by continuous work and conflict.
Ant society is a world of females.
Colonies are dominated by the queen ant, and she controls the reproduction of her colony. The queen starts life as a winged creature, and along with winged male ants they leave an established colony to start a new population. They emerge from the next, often in vast swarms, and mate in midair. The females land, rip off their wings, and begin digging to establish a colony. The males simply die in heaps, after having lived a short but lets hope reproductive life.