The balbyter ant Camponotus fulvopilosus combines several navigational strategies to support homing when foraging in the close vicinity of its nest
Many insects rely on path integration to define direct routes back to their nests. When shuttling hundreds of meters back and forth between a profitable foraging site and a nest, navigational errors accumulate unavoidably in this compass- and odometer-based system. In familiar terrain, terrestrial landmarks can be used to compensate for these errors and safely guide the insect back to its nest wit
