Depending on temperature, it can take 20 to 45 days for an egg to develop into an adult worker. Workers can live as long as 9 months at 75 degrees F, but life spans usually are between 1 and 6 months under warmer outdoor conditions. Queens live an average of 6 to 7 years. Their food preferences change depending on the nutritional requirements of the colony. In the spring and summer, when food is abundant, the colony produces new offspring, and the protein needs of the colony increase.
Fire ants are only able to ingest liquids.
Once liquefied, the fourth instar larvae suck up the protein and regurgitate it to the workers, which pass it on tothe rest of the colony. Workers will forage for food more than 100 feet from the nest. When a large food source is found, fire ants recruit other workers to help take the food back to the colony. Liquids are ingested at the food source, and stored within the ants until they are regurgitated to other ants within the colony. Liquids from solid foods are extracted at the source or are carried back as solid particles.