Anting (bird activity)

In the behavior called anting, birds rub insects on their feathers, usually ants, which secrete liquids containing chemicals such as formic acid, that can act as an insecticide, miticide, fungicide, or bactericide. It possibly also supplements the bird's own preen oil. Instead of ants, birds can also use millipedes. Over 250 species of bird have been known to ant.

History

This behaviour was first described by Erwin Stresemann in German as einemsen in Ornithologische Monatsberichte XLIII. 138 in 1935. The Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society XXXVIII described it in English in the following year and translated the term as "anting".

Variations

Some birds, including starlings, babblers, tanagers, blue jays, and weavers, ant actively; that is, they pick up ants with their beak and rub them over their feathers. There are also passive anters, who simply lie over anthills, such as the Eurasian Jay, crows and waxbills.

Some birds have been seen dusting themselves with soil from ant-hills and this has been considered by some as equivalent to anting.

Function

It has been suggested that anting acts as way of reducing feather parasites such as mites or in controlling fungi or bacteria, however there has been no convincing support for any of the theories. The choice of ants used however indicates that the chemicals that they release are in some way important. Some cases of anting involved the use of millipedes and these too are known to release powerful defensive chemicals.

Some suggestions have been that anting may be related to feather moulting however this correlation may also be attributed to greater activity of ants in summer.

References