Mysterious ants 'click' midnight bell

The doorbell rang continuously in the middle of the night, causing an old lady in Germany to panic. When the police came to her house, they found out that the culprit was ants.

The ants Lasius neglectus.(Photo: PA)

The incident happened in the city of Offenburg, Germany. A 75-year-old woman phoned the police station around 3 am on May 30 because the doorbell kept ringing in the middle of the night. This situation has been going on for several days.

When a police team arrived at the old lady's house, they saw an ant nest in the ring's electric breaker. Because the ant nest is so big, it overrides many parts of the bell system, causing the bell to ring, Guardian reports.

But what confuses the police is that the experts cannot determine the species of the ants in the old lady's house. They just guessed that they were pharaoh ants . Scientists have found them in mummies in Egypt.

Ant pharaoh prefers warm climates and like to nest in electrical circuits - where heat is constantly emitted. They have appeared in many hospitals. Some babies in hospitals in eastern Germany suffered from ants wound when they were in an incubator.

Some experts guess the culprit in the 75-year-old grandmother's house is Lasius neglectus , a giant ant in Asia and also interested in electricity. It was discovered that about 35,000 of the Lasius neglectus bodies were found in a box of electrical conduits in the UK.