Honey ant queens share a throne

Another factoid on ants: typically, when a person spots an ant inside their residence, they assume the worst. They fear a swarming, thriving ant colony is breeding inside their home.<p>This is almost never the case.<p>Most species of ants live in hollow trees, logs, landscaping timbers, and soil, and will march hundreds of metres from their colony in search of food.<p>If you see ants in your home, there's no need to napalm your carpets or use traps and poisons. Have compassion. Keeping your floors clear of carbohydrate rich foods will keep most ants busy looking elsewhere.<p>And for the odd ant scout that goes walking by? Look the other way. They're not the enemy. They are your friend. They are a part of nature.

I've always wondered... how much of these nature documentaries are shot in the wild, and how much is shot in a controlled environment? From the write-up I presume that the outside shot of the queens working together was 'real' -- but when the camera pans down, is that some kind of artificial ant farm?

&#62; Mr Mendez pointed out that, rather than valuing a single sovereign, the worker ants were simply picking off the weakest queens to manage their resources better.<p>wow that looks like a really good strategy - first the queens help each other out to improve their chances of building a good nest and then they get starved by possibly their own "kids" so that the colony is driven by the strongest queen. The article doesn't provide much detail about how do they select "the weakest link" though