Fire Ant! 🐜 One Of The Most Dangerous Insects In The World

"Red ant" redirects here. For the species Pogonomyrmex barbatus, see Red harvester ant. For other uses, see Fire ant (disambiguation).
Fire ant
Temporal range: Early Oligocene–Recent
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Fire ants 01.jpg
Scientific classificatione
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Arthropoda
Class: Insecta
Order: Hymenoptera
Family: Formicidae
Subfamily: Myrmicinae
Tribe: Solenopsidini
Genus: Solenopsis
Westwood, 1840
Type species
Atta geminata
Fabricius, 1804
Diversity[1]
201 species
Fire ants are several species of ants in the genus Solenopsis, which includes over 200 species. Solenopsis are stinging ants, and most of their common names reflect this, for example, ginger ants and tropical fire ants. Many of the names shared by this genus are often used interchangeably to refer to other species of ant, such as the term red ant, mostly because of their similar coloration despite not being in the genus Solenopsis. Both Myrmica rubra and Pogonomyrmex barbatus are common examples of non-Solenopsis ants being termed red ants.[2]