Nest Distribution and Dynamics of Colony Movement of Red Imported Fire Ant in Lawn

The nest spatial distribution and dynamics of colony movement of red imported fire ant were studied in the lawn of Guangzhou. The results revealed that the spatial distribution of fire ant nests alternated between random and uniform pattern, and the random pattern was dominant. The average distance between the neighbouring fire ant nests was 6.88 m. The highest increase of nest density, 0.305×10 ^-2 nest/m ², appeared in April, and the highest reduction of nest density was 0.19 ×10 ^-2 nest/m ² in May. Average nest migration rate in April was 20.7%, which was higher than that in other months. The average occupied time of nests was 43 d, and the mean movement distance of the colonies was 5.57 m. The disappearing rate of newly-founded colonies reached as high as 31.48% within the first week, and then kept below 10%.