Insect and Spider Identification: CLOSED: Wood-eating ants, 1 by thymewarp13

thymewarp13 wrote:
It's obvious to me (though the photo may not show it) that I'm dealing with little brown ants that are either eating the wood of a stair rail or chewing out the insides and removing it so that they can build a nest of some sort inside. I've had some experience with big black carpenter ants and these brown ants are much smaller than they are. Any help on what kind of critter these munchers are would be appreciated.