At another time you may see columns of them in an ant safari with two-way traffic as they cross a lawn or invade a kitchen to forage for food.
All ants live in colonies.
Ants are called social insects because within each colony there is a division of labor with males, females and one or more castes of workers each performing certain tasks for the benefit of the whole group. A single colony may vary in size from a few dozen individuals up to millions. Some naturalists suppose that ants are more numerous than any other type of land animal others think that plant lice outnumber them. In most kinds of ants a new colony is started by a young queen. Immediately after the mating flight she loses her wings, then digs a hole in the ground or finds a cavity under a rock or beneath the bark of a tree.