Establishing communication through portable devices without the dependence on or constraints of any central infrastructure is possible in Ad hoc networks. But this very feature of the absence of a central infrastructure and the random mobility of the devices also give rise to multiple problems involving security and routing. The challenge encountered by multicast routing protocols in this ambience is to envisage creating a multi-hop routing within the constraints of the mobility of the host and the bandwidth. The role of multicast routing in wireless ad hoc networks is very significant and pivotal. We intend presenting in this paper a novel on-demand multicast routing protocol known as Cross-Layered Ant Colony Optimization Multicast Routing Protocol (CLAMR). This selected protocol is an improved and enhanced version of the already existing on-demand multicast routing protocol (ODMRP) with the enhancement of Bio-inspired Ant Colony mechanism. The fundamental mechanism of ODMRP is utilized in the proposed method along with the enhanced features of cross layer, applying ant colony optimization. This CLAMR is a robust and efficient protocol with minimal overhead. The scalability and improved performance levels of the proposed algorithm at higher traffic load in comparison to the existing algorithms are evident from the simulations performed using network simulator 2. © 2015, Institute of Integrative Omics and Applied Biotechnology. All rights reserved.