One is an anteater that eats termites, and the other is an army ant that eats everything. Which one is stronger?

Termites, a type of winged insect that can efficiently degrade cellulose, although small in size, can turn a wooden house into dust.

Although this little bug is very powerful and difficult to deal with, it is not without rivals. In nature, there is a kind of mammal that is its natural enemy, and that mammal is the anteater. The distribution of anteaters is not particularly widespread, and there are not many species. This animal only lives in America, and there are only four species. The largest one is called the "giant anteater", which can be up to 2.5 meters long, and the smallest is the "pygmy anteater", with an average body length of about 35 centimeters. The main food of anteaters is termites, but they are not picky eaters, and ants are also on their menu, although ants and termites are two completely different creatures because ants belong to the order Hymenoptera.

The anteater's body structure is specially designed for eating small social insects such as termites and ants. When hunting, it first uses the sharp claws on its forelimbs to pry open the anthill, then extends its long and pointed snout into the anthill, and finally uses its tongue, which is one-third of its body length, to cover the termites and put them into its mouth.

For termites, anteaters are nightmares, but for anteaters, the same is true. The hunting process of anteaters is not as easy as it seems, because although termites are vegetarians, their fighting ability should not be underestimated. The termites that are disturbed will launch a fierce counterattack against the anteater, so the hunting time of anteaters is actually much shorter than we think. It will not lie on the anthill and feast on it. The whole eating process actually takes less than a minute.

An ant nest only eats for one minute. How many ant nests are needed to eat enough? Actually, one ant nest is enough.

We often hear such sayings: "An anteater can eat tens of thousands of termites a day." This saying is actually just a gimmick to attract attention, just like "a person can eat 50 kilograms of food a day." Can a person eat 50 kilograms of food a day? Of course, judging from the speed of human chewing and swallowing, if you eat non-stop for 24 hours, you may eat more than 50 kilograms, but in fact, a person only needs to eat one or two kilograms a day. The same is true for anteaters. The tongue of an anteater can spit out 150 times per minute, so it can eat thousands of termites in a minute. In this way, it is easy to eat hundreds of thousands of termites a day, but in fact, an anteater only needs to eat a few hundred termites a day.

Why do anteaters eat so little?

The amount of food an animal eats is closely related to three factors, namely, weight, activity level, and body temperature. There is no need to say much about weight and activity level. As for body temperature, the higher the body temperature of an animal, the greater its energy demand. Mammals are warm-blooded animals, and their body temperature is not affected by the outside world. In order to ensure the constant body temperature, a certain amount of energy is required to maintain it. The higher the body temperature, the more energy is required to maintain it. For example, a 400-jin cow eats about 35 kilograms of grass a day, while an elephant weighing about 5 tons needs to eat about 250 kilograms of grass a day. It can be seen that in terms of weight and food intake, elephants eat less than cows. Why? Because the average body temperature of cows is 38.3℃, while the average body temperature of elephants is only 35.5℃.

The lower the body temperature, the less it eats, and the anteater's body temperature is only 33°C, so it can meet its needs by eating a few hundred ants a day.

Although anteaters are mammals that specialize in eating termites and ants, they do not dare to eat all kinds of "ants". They absolutely dare not touch army ants. Army ants, like other ants, are highly social animals, but they do not have fixed nests. They always move forward in neat rows. The number of army ants in a large group can reach more than one million, and even the smallest group will not be less than 500,000. Army ants are huge, about three times the size of termites, and they also have a pair of hard and sharp jaws that can easily penetrate the skin of ordinary mammals, including anteaters.

In nature, no animal dares to block the advance of army ants, because any creature that blocks their advance will become meat in their mouths, and anteaters are no exception.

So when an anteater sees a group of army ants, instead of rushing forward to lick them, it will run away in dismay. Anteaters dare to eat termites, so why don't they dare to lick away some army ants? Although termites, which are good at chewing wood, also have powerful jaws, they are small in size after all, so they will not cause serious harm to anteaters. However, army ants are different. They are three times the size of termites, so it is not just a matter of pain when they take a bite. Therefore, army ants are the strongest existence in the jungle, a bit like the cat-and-mouse eating in "Black Cat Sheriff".

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