At London’s Natural History Museum, demise of queen ant spelt the end for her workers – but another queen is on her way

In the words of one observer, it is “possibly the saddest, most heartbreaking ‘This exhibit is currently out of order’ sign ever” – the ant colony at London’s Natural History Museum has a sign on it that reads: “The queen ant has died.”

The sign goes on to explain that:

“When this happens the colony fails to survive. The worker ants are in the process of dismantling the fungus garden nests, then they will also die.”

All that is now left of the Trinidad Leaf-Cutter ant colony is a pile of discarded leaves, some shredded paper, and the remains of several dead ants that have yet to be cleaned out.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest The empty any colony at London’s Natural History Museum. Photograph: Martin Belam/The Guardian

The whole scene is being played out in front of the museum’s thousands of daily visitors in the Creepy Crawlies gallery, where an ant colony has been one of the main attractions for some time. The museum even used to have a webcam trained on the ants so you could keep an eye on them remotely.



Leaf-cutter ants feed by deliberately growing fungus in their nest on the leaves that they drag there, and ants are one of only four groups of animal on Earth believed to have discovered agriculture. Myrmecologists think that ants first began farming fungus about 50m years ago, and in order to be able to stock their colony, they can carry 5,000 times their own body weight.



But there is no fungus being farmed in the Natural History Museum any more, as a succession of visitors pressed their faces to the empty display, looking for any signs of life behind the glass.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest A family peer into the empty ant colony. Photograph: Martin Belam/The Guardian

Insiders at the museum say the queen died some time ago, and that this happens every few years. It is this melancholy expressed in Russell Bloor’s tweet that has drawn wider attention to the colony’s plight.

Russell Bloor (@MoonCat666) Possibly the saddest, most heart breaking "This exhibit is currently out of order" sign ever!! pic.twitter.com/NtDdKfZM7s

The good news? The museum’s sign ends optimistically, by saying the exhibit is waiting for a new queen to arrive. Although maybe don’t hold your breath as one member of museum staff tweeted last night that the queen actually died over a year ago.

But standing beside the forlorn ex-colony this week, a teacher began explaining to her school group that the next exhibit they were going to see was the dinosaurs. The excitement of the 15 or so children was something to behold. As sad as the demise of the ant colony is, it is unlikely ants will ever shift dinosaurs from the public’s affections as the museum’s number one attraction.