Individual foragers can flexibly modify their immediate strategy to maintain foraging efficiency

To deal with unpredictability in the availability of food resources, animals must adapt their behaviour to optimise foraging efficiency. Various mechanisms can influence an individual’s food acquisition, and thus our knowledge of their combined impact on foraging efficiency remains limited. In social insects, most behavioural studies focus on the colony level, averaging group reactions without accounting for individual characteristics crucial for colony performance. In this individual-based study, we examined how internal (e.g., experience), social (e.g., colony and brood size), and environmental (e.g., food distribution) factors affect the foraging activity, exploration, and performance of the giant ant Dinoponera quadriceps. Additionally, we aimed to determine whether these foraging traits remained consistent over time and across different conditions. We found that solitary foragers of D. quadriceps were highly efficient (retrieving food in 77.38% of the trips), especially when exploiting aggregated and abundant food resources. However, individual foraging success declined with more conspecific foragers and prolonged experience. Foragers increased their exploration levels to maintain efficiency in environments with larger numbers of dispersed prey items. Individual foraging activity rose with experience and was higher in smaller colonies with fewer foragers. Furthermore, foragers consistently exhibited different levels of activity, exploration, and success rates. These findings provide a comprehensive view of how various factors combine to give rise to complex behaviours such as foraging. Additionally, they emphasise the importance of individual traits for effective task performance within social groups.