Authorities in Mexico’s Jalisco state seized a parcel containing 105 queen harvester ants concealed in toys on July 9. The shipment, sent from El Salto in Jalisco and destined for Laos, was falsely labeled “collectible figures,” authorities said in a press release. The parcel delivery company reported a suspicious package to Mexico’s Federal Attorney for Environmental Protection (Profepa). They found the ants. Each one stuffed in a test tube with a cotton ball, hidden inside two plastic toys; 18 of the 105 queen ants were dead, authorities said. The surviving ants were released in the Cerro Viejo Protected Natural Area in Jalisco. An ant expert determined the harvester ants belonged to the genus Pogonomyrmex, according to the release, and are native to the deserts of the Americas, including Mexico. Further investigations related to this seizure are ongoing, authorities said. Insects, including ants, have become targets for wildlife trafficking in recent years. Harvester ants are particularly in demand for their complex colony-building skills and are kept in specialized artificial ant habitats known as formicariums. “This seizure is another indicator of the globally booming interest in ants,” Sandra Altherr, cofounder of the German NGO Pro Wildlife, told Mongabay in an email. In 2025, Kenyan authorities confiscated more than 5,300 endemic harvester ants and arrested four suspects — two Belgians, one Kenyan national and one Vietnamese national.  In a recent online survey of ant trading websites, Altherr’s team found more than 360 different species of ants from all over the world for sale,…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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