Ants

By Stephanie Fox -
There are these very large black ants in the forest that I often see marching around in neat lines of say 100 ants in single or double file. The other day Charles and I came upon them loading all of their larvae out of the nest. Perhaps spring cleaning? I’m not sure. It was awesome, but simultaneously gave me goose bumps. They had stacked all the larvae, which looked to me like large pill capsules, only black, into a well-guarded pile at the entrance of their nest. While we were watching, one of their neat and tidy lines returned to the nest, each ant carrying a small package in her pinchers  - Charles thought these packages were the victory of their hunting trip. I wanted to see what it was exactly that they were carrying and couldn’t resist gently poking one with a stick in the hopes that she might drop her load to better battle the stick. She did not, and instead I witnessed the coolest ant alarm signal – there was a sort of hissing sound that arose into the air and I could see the frantic reaction travel down the line like dominos. A few ants left the line to assess the situation, and after finding only my unsuspicious seeming boot they all returned to their neat and tidy line. Within seconds of this disturbance, every last larva had been tucked back into the nest. 

Later, while walking back from the forest, I saw the same species of ant attacking a worm. This type of worm is something like our earthworm, but much longer and they seem to travel on top to the soil surface with greater efficiency than earthworms – I might even say they are speedy. There were only 4 or 5 ants at the site – perhaps comparable to 4 or 5 rats trying to take down a moose.  Yet, I watched them split the worm into two, then three pieces. The effective technique was a pinch-and-hold-on, which took an attempt or two, and then the worm would flop about in a struggle, and eventually the piece would break off. 

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