Certain species of which one of the following organisms are well known as cultivators of fungi?
Answer & explanation
Answer: (a) Ant
Ants are the well-known fungus farmers among these options. The fungus-gardening (attine) ants, including leafcutter ants of the American tropics, grow fungus in their nests as their food.
- ✓ (a) Attine ants, more than 250 species, cultivate fungi as their main food. Leafcutter ants cut leaves, carry them into underground nests and use them to feed the fungus.
- ✗ (b) Cockroaches are not known as fungus cultivators.
- ✗ (c) Crabs are not known as fungus cultivators.
- ✗ (d) Spiders are not known as fungus cultivators.
Remember · Fungus-growing (attine) ants, such as leafcutter ants, farm fungus in their nests as food. This is an example of mutualism between an insect and a fungus.
Sources
- Meirelles et al. (2015), Shared Escovopsis parasites between leaf-cutting and non-leaf-cutting ants in the higher attine fungus-growing ant symbiosis, Royal Society Open Science (via PubMed Central) ↗ “All known attine ants (more than 250 described species within 16 genera) cultivate basidiomycetous fungi as the primary source of food”
- Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute: Darwinian Diet (agricultural ants in Panama) ↗ · reference work “The ants do not eat the leaves; they eat the fungus.”
Question and answer: UPSC's official GS Paper I (2022, Series A) — paper ↗ · answer key ↗. Explanation: Minimalist IAS, checked 1 Oct 2026 (how we verify). ·