The Bullet Ant – The dangerous Paraponera clavata, more commonly known as the Bullet ant, is found in the rainforests from Nicaragua all the way to Paraguay. This area also includes the Amazon rainforest. The Bullet ant received it’s name due to people feeling like a bullet had hit them when the ant stings. The stinger of this ant is attached to it’s abdomen, and is about 1-3 mm long, and the ant itself is 18-25 mm long. These ants are very interesting, and are used by the Satere-Mawe people of Brazil in ceremonies. Being stung by just one of these ants can cause excruciating pain for about five through eight hours, and also can cause paralysis and uncontrollable shaking for up to five days after the stinging. These ants are dangerous, and have been said to have the most painful and debilitating sting for any insect. On the Schmidt Sting Pain Index it has a rating of 4.0+ (Justin Schmidt gets stung by insects, and rates the pain) which means that the sting is “Pure, intense, brilliant pain. Like fire-walking over flaming charcoal with a 3-inch rusty nail in your heel”.
The Satere-Mawe people have young boys and teenage boys participate in a very painful ceremony. The boys in order to become a warrior must be stung by multiple ants at a time. The ants are captured in the forest, then are made unconscious with a natural substance from the forests, and are then placed in a glove made of leaves with the stingers facing towards the inside of the glove. When the ants are conscious again a boy will place his hand into one and get stung by multiple ants. The boys must wear the large gloves that look like oven mitts for ten minutes and endure the pain of all the stings. After taking the gloves off, they must endure the pain. From being injected with the ant’s venom, which has neurotoxins in it, which causes the paralysis, the boys must endure the pain, as there is no antidote to inhibit the pain. To become a warrior the boys must be stung by these ants in twenty separate ceremonies which can take anywhere from several months to several year.
There have not been that many reported stingings of this ant, but the few that have been reported say that the yare very painful. Some stings that have been accounted to science are Bequaert (1926), Weber (1937, 1939), McCluskey & Brown (1972), Schmidt (1990) and Morgan (1996). The pain from the stings of this ant last fro about 24 hours, that is how it got it’s name as the 24 Hour ant, though it is more often referred to as the Bullet ant.. On the TV show Wildboyz, with Steve-O, from Jackass, he puts his hand into a glove full of these ants, and he was willing to try it. He was with the Satere-Mawe people when he did this, and was in agonizing pain. The first reported stinging was in 1926 by Charles Joseph Beaquaert. The pain of the stinging has been compared to 30 times worse than a wasp sting, a bullet hitting you, and many other painful experiences. The stinging can’t kill anyone, unless someone is allergic to the venom, but would cause a great deal of pain.
This ant can be found from Nicaragua to the Peru, and is found on the floors of most forests within the area they live. They make there nests near the bases of trees, or in arboreal cavities. The ant has very few enemies, other than parasitoid Phorid flies, conspecifics from other various colonies, and some kinds of funguses can kill it. Bullet ants won’t attack unless they are threatened by something, or when something disturbs it during food foraging. Unlike most ant species, the queen of the Bullet ant is relative in size to the worker ants.
This dangerous ant is very interesting because of the sting it can give anyone, and how the Satere-Mawe use it for there ceremonies. Getting stung by one of these would be very unpleasant. An ant that is almost one inch long is scary enough, but one that can sting you and put you in massive pain is very scary to think of. Being such a small insect, if you were to see one of this without knowing what it could do, you’d be amazed to find out how dangerous it is. This insect is probably the most dangerous insect in the world, even though it can’t kill you.
Works Cited:
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=75c_1175334572&p;=1
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neurotoxin
http://www.asktheexterminator.com/ants/Bullet_Ant.shtml
http://www.painfulbite.com/bullet_ant.php
