Male leaf-cutting ants, (Acromyrmex versicolor), fly over the Sonoran Desert, waiting to mate with females after a monsoon rain.


Male leaf-cutting ants, (Acromyrmex versicolor), fly over the Sonoran Desert along Catalina Highway, awaiting virgin queens who fly into the swarm to mate. They fly during the Arizona summer monsoon season, early in the morning following a heavy rain.


Size: 4287px × 2848px
Location: Mount Lemmon, Santa Catalina Mountains, Coronado National Forest, Sonoran Desert, Arizona, USA
Photo credit: © Norma Jean Gargasz / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No

Keywords: acromyrmex, ant, ants, arizona, attine, attini, biodiversity, biological, biology, bug, bugs, catalina, coronado, dawn, desert, deserts, downpour, early, ecological, ecology, entomology, environment, environmental, flies, flight, fly, flying, forest, forests, formicidae, heavy, highway, highways, hymenoptera, insect, insects, land, lands, leaf-cutting, leafcutter, leafcutting, lemmon, male, males, mate, mating, microburst, monsoon, morning, mount, mountain, mountains, mutualism, myrmicinae, national, natural, nature, neotropical, nuptial, nuptials, public, queens, rain, raining, rainy, santa, science, sciences, season, seasons, soaking, sonoran, species, summer, sun, sunrise, swarm, swarming, torrential, tropical, tucson, usa, versicolor, virgin, virgins, wings