Crazy ants of a hairy and biting variety, millions of them, are invading southern United States, from Texas to Florida. These crazy ants, known for their swarming, are now posting a threat to the local industry in the region.

Millions of hairy, crazy ants moves from Texas to Louisiana, Mississippi causing damage from beehives to agriculture and even industrial equipments.

The ants’ scientific name is Nylanderia pubens, and they’re first seen in Florida in the ’50s and in Texas in 2002. Now they are moving and posing a threat to Louisiana.

A pest control agency in Sulphur sent a sample of the “hairy crazy ants” to the Louisiana State Arthropod Museum, where curator Victoria Bayless identified the species for the first time. She said that the speed of these ants’ migration into the rest of Louisiana is unpredictable because of the new climate.

Bayless said the main difference between these species and other ant species is the size of the colonies. A single colony can contain millions of the pests because there are multiple queens, or head ants, that work together.

Hairy crazy ants have also been reported in walls of houses, she said. They can cause electrical shortages as they accumulate in large numbers. Its bite also cause similar allergic reactions to other ant bites.

Bayless further said that controlling these ants can be tricky as these crazy insects reproduce rapidly and do not respond to normal pest control methods and researchers have not yet found a way to prevent or get rid of the ants.

Photo Credit: AP