Carpenter Ant Dump Pile - Camponotus sp.

I came across this perfect pile of sawdust under a rotting log in a deciduous forest. The sawdust comes from carpenter ants, who are furiously working to excavate and create galleries inside the log. Carpenter ants don’t eat wood, but they use their jaws to tear pieces of wood out of a log when creating their galleries inside. They are very fastidious creatures and like to keep clean galleries, so they constantly push debris out of their living space. They cut slits in the wood (notice the long slit in the log), and below these slits, you'll see their dump site - little piles that look like sawdust. If you carefully inspect the dump pile, you will notice that it's not only made of wood shavings, but also insect parts and any other refuse that they don't want in their home.