Barrie Galpin
Fifty years ago it was said that no visitor to Bedford Purlieus could fail to notice the numerous large nest mounds of the wood ants. The mounds and the ants’ descendants are still there, fascinating visitors, today. Here Barrie shares some research he’s been doing into these amazing insects and wonders if they can contribute to nature recovery in Rockingham Forest.
I should say at the outset that until very recently, I knew next to nothing about ants. Birds are much more my thing, although, since moving to live in Fineshade, I have picked up lots of random snippets of information about a much wider spectrum of wildlife. But, until a year or two ago, ants had held little interest. But all that changed when, encouraged by other members of the Rockingham Forest Vision team, I began seriously to explore Bedford Purlieus.
And there for the first time I saw my first local colony of wood ants – a rounded dome of dark brown vegetation on which, even seen from a distance, there appeared to be continuous surface movements. My binoculars revealed that there was indeed a hive (no that’s the wrong word!) of activity. The entire surface of the mound was covered in busy, busy scarperings. Ants carrying small bits of vegetation, ants heading off with purpose in different directions. In some ways it seemed chaotic, but at the same time these insects all seemed to know exactly what they were doing.
I watched quietly from a short distance for a couple of minutes and then happened to glance down at my feet. There, scurrying along a well-determined but narrow channel in the grass were more of the ants, some moving away from the nest and others returning to it carrying small bits of leaves, twigs and other debris. And these ants were big! Far bigger than those that upset my mother so much when they invaded our house back in the summers of the 1950s. These ants seemed to be as long as my little-finger nail and there were huge numbers of them passing right close to my feet. I felt the hairs rise on the back of my neck as I fought to subdue the totally unreasonable fear that I’m sure must have been instilled in me as a boy. Some parents have a lot to answer for - thanks for that, mum!
I started to wonder how many nests like this were nearby in the wood? And what were these ants doing here in Bedford Purlieus, the jewel of the Rockingham Forest crown? I knew for sure that there weren’t any in Fineshade Wood just three or four miles away. Were there any in other parts of the forest nearby? Where was the next nearest colony? Are they a Good Thing to have in a wood or are they harmful? Over the last months I’ve been finding answers to some questions like this and I’d like to share some of them with you now.
How many nests nearby?
Last summer (2024) I paid several visits to the Purlieus and started to record where I found the nests. Without a great deal of effort I found eleven, spread out as shown in this map. This certainly was not a rigorous survey. There were some areas where I couldn’t find any and other areas that I didn’t search at all. But it did show that they are quite widespread across the woodland.
Where else can you find them?
I asked around and nobody seemed to know of any other wood ant colonies in Rockingham Forest and a visit to the website of the Northants Biological Records Centre confirmed that the only county records are in Bedford Purlieus. Another very useful online resource is the National Biodiversity Network Atlas https://nbnatlas.org and from there I was able to produce this map showing records of Formica rufa, the Southern Wood Ant. Bedford Purlieus is shown with an arrow
(the other nearby record was a single observation from Rutland Water Nature Reserve in 2012).
There is also a UK Wood Ant Steering Group which has a website devoted to UK Wood Ants https://www.woodants.org.uk. From there I discovered that there are three true wood ant species in the UK and several related species. The ones in Bedford Purlieus are strictly Formica rufa or Southern Wood Ants and the two other similar species are found in Scotland.
How long have they been here? 20th century records
Again, asking around, local wisdom seemed to think that these wood ants were probably introduced here – but no-one is able to suggest a reason for why that was done, or indeed when. Then someone suggested I look in the definitive and detailed report on Bedford Purlieus carried out fifty years ago for the National Environmental Research Council. A section of that report on invertebrates is available online here https://nora.nerc.ac.uk/id/eprint/6924/
(Welch, R.C.. 1975 Invertebrata. In: Peterken, G.F.; Welch, R.C., (eds.) Bedford Purlieus: its history, ecology and management. Abbots Ripton, NERC/ITE, 136-187. (ITE Symposium, 7).
On pages 149-50 I found the following paragraphs and, really helpfully, a map.
HYMENOPTERA
No visitor to Bedford Purlieus can fail to notice the numerous large nest mounds of the wood ant Formica rufa L. The distribution of those nests occupied during 1974 is shown on Fig. 38. Thornhaugh is one of the localities listed by Enid Nelmes (1938) in her survey of the distribution of the wood ant in England, Wales and Scotland which was begun in 1933.
These ants are popularly believed to have been introduced into the wood but no records can be traced to substantiate this, although Nelmes (p.92) states that "in some places they have been introduced as food for pheasants; such as Harleston Firs, Northants". Introduced or not their present distribution within the wood is difficult to explain. 155 nests were occupied during 1974. Of these 54 are under conifers and approximately 35 are situated along the northern edge of rides running in an east-west direction. This is a favoured position for catching the most sun.
Another 20 nests are associated with the wartime clearance area, many of which are situated at the edge of the hut bases. On the other hand more than 90 nests correlate with the well drained brown rendzina soils over the various limestones.
Wow! I was amazed -they found 155 occupied nests in 1974!
I wonder how many we would find if we carried out a proper survey in 2025? And the distribution from my own sketchy survey last year seems suspiciously similar to the map from 50 years ago.
How long have they been here? The possibility of 19th century records.
In 1830 the local poet John Clare wrote the following poem.
The Ants
by John Clare
What wonder strikes the curious, while he views
The black ant's city, by a rotten tree,
Or woodland bank! In ignorance we muse:
Pausing, annoyed, — we know not what we see,
Such government and thought there seem to be;
Some looking on, and urging some to toil,
Dragging their loads of bent-stalks slavishly:
And what's more wonderful, when big loads foil
One ant or two to carry, quickly then
A swarm flock round to help their fellow-men.
Surely they speak a language whisperingly,
Too fine for us to hear; and sure their ways
Prove they have kings and laws, and that they be
Deformed remnants of the Fairy-days.
Richard Eckton, my former neighbour and mentor of all things arboreal, was Wildlife Ranger with the Forestry Commission for many years and knew the Bedford Purlieus colonies well. He has suggested that John Clare’s line “Dragging their loads of bent-stalks slavishly” describes perfectly the behaviour of wood ants and this suggests that the species were likely to be present here in the early 19th century.
Fascinating facts
At this stage in my journey into learning about wood ants Santa Claus stepped in to help, delivering a copy of Ants: The ultimate social insects by Richard Jones, (Bloomsbury Wildlife, 2022). It's a lovely, well-written book and here are some of the things that I've found very interesting about our Formica rufa species so far:
Counts of individuals at mature nests vary from 100,00 to 400,00.
They have comparatively small brains - seemingly at odds with their complex social behaviour.
Colonies are made up of workers (all female), males and queens.
Males and queens have wings that are used only once in their lifetime.
Typically they fly on a calm day in April or May.
After mating males die within hours, but inseminated queens may live on for many years.
Typically 60,000 food items a day are brought back to the nest.
Most of the food is given to the grubs or larvae.
They predate other insects but most of the diet is honeydew produced by aphids in trees.
A colony may collect up to half a tonne of honeydew a year.
They do not sting - but they do use formic acid for defence.
The acid can be squirted with precision as far as 20 or 30cm.
They can run at a speed of 5cm per second.
There may be range contraction with changes in woodland management a possible cause.
Are they a “Good Thing”?
The answer to this question appears to be, simply, yes!
The UK Wood Ants website https://www.woodants.org.uk/ecology/species/significance has a page that is well worth reading. It explains that wood ants perform a number of important roles in the forest ecosystem, earning them the status of “keystone” species that play critical roles in the structure of the woodlands. In addition to this, their thatched mounds are home to a community of specialist insects and forest residents, some of which are found nowhere else. For example, another tiny ant species, the Shining Guest Ant, occurs only inside Red Wood Ant mounds - I wonder whether they are hidden away they in Bedford Purlieus too?
How about a translocation?
It occurs to me that if we are serious about Nature Recovery in Rockingham Forest, it may well be worth considering the possibility of moving some of the Southern Wood Ants from Bedford Purlieus to other parts of the remaining fragments of Rockingham Forest. In Scotland, the nests of some of their near cousins, Hairy Wood Ants, are being moved to other parts of the forest (See here https://www.highlandsrewilding.co.uk/blog/reintroducing-the-small-but-mighty-hairy-wood-ant )
I know a couple of woodland managers who might be interested in the idea. It would be a relatively cheap and interesting thing to do – possibly using volunteer labour - and could well, in time, contribute significantly to the biodiversity of Rockingham Forest.
However, translocations need to be very carefully planned and there are protocols to be followed. DEFRA have a 79-page guidance document https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/reintroductions-and-conservation-translocations-in-england-code-guidance-and-forms.
There is also a very useful and detailed article providing good practice guidance on wood ant translocation here, https://cairngorms.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/CNPA2022Wood-Ant-Translocation-Guidance.pdf)
(Wiswell, H., Attewell, P., Carroll, S. and Stockran, J. (2022) Wood Ant Translocation: Good Practice Guidance. Cairngorms National Park Authority.)
Two key questions for us would be whether any new site really is suitable for the ants to thrive there, and, very importantly, is the Bedford Purlieus population strong enough to sustain the removal of some nests? We could certainly make a start on answering that last question by carrying out a thorough survey of the Bedford Purlieus site during the spring and summer of 2025.
How about setting up a project?
In order to move forward we’d probably need:
· volunteers to carry out surveys,
· locally based scientific expertise – particularly in ants or related invertebrates,
· organisers to plan, publicise and carry out a project,
· agreement from Natural England and Forestry England to remove nests from Bedford Purlieus,
· man- and woman-power to carry out the work,
· someone to raise some money from donations, grants, crowdfunding.
If you are at all interested in trying to learn more about the wood ants of Bedford Purlieus and perhaps to get actively involved in some Nature Recovery in the wider forest, I’d love to hear from you. Please get in touch and let’s talk about it! Please contact me by email: barrie.galpin@zen.co.uk
Postscript - updated 11 January
I've just found this interesting short video made by Buglife which shows Wood Ants bringing prey into a nest mound and how colonies use ventilation holes to regulate the temperature of the nest
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