Worker ant

“ It has been taken for granted that worker ants are necessarily sterile and that they possess morphological, physiological and psychological characters not represented in the queens of their species. On such assumptions it is, of course, impossible to understand how the workers can have come by the obviously adaptive and exquisitely correlated characters, which they are unable to transmit. ”

“ Several times I took away the piece of leaf and the worker would immediately attack another ant and endeavour to get his leaf, and sometimes a number of ants would become involved in the melee. The ant finally left without a leaf would start back on the trail, for it seemed to be an inviolable rule never to go back to the nest without a section of leaf. These leaves are stored away where they ferment and form one of the foods of these industrious little workers. ”

“ When at last the eggs are laid and hatched, she feeds her children on saliva, the very juice of her body, for she is still fasting. Nor is the strain relaxed till the larvæ undergo their transformation into pupæ, and, after a brief sleep, emerge as “worker” Ants, puny in stature owing to the poorness of their food during larval life. In some species this fast may last for ten long months. So soon, however, as these little workers emerge, like dutiful daughters they make their way to the outer world, and go forth in search of food, which they share with their now exhausted mother. ”

“ They do all their seeing by means of those two or more colors, farther out in the rainbow than the violet, to which we human beings are totally blind.
There is a considerable practical convenience in this. The worker ants, while they themselves run freely in and out of the nest, from darkness to light, usually try to keep their eggs and young in the dark. So when you turn over a stone and open into an ants’ nest, the most that you get is a glimpse of piles of white eggs or larvae, and a throng of workers skurrying about to drag them out of sight into the ground. ”

“ They engaged in senseless programmed activities like ants: the mating frivolity before working and hoarding. As rich as they were (these future owners of their parents’ factories) they were walking down the same hill toward their deaths no different than the worker ants. ”

“ Now these worker ants are destitute of stings, and I can only suppose that their power of combination, stronger jaws and more horny coats, have gained them this immunity. I remarked that the smaller lizards appeared to have some difficulty in dealing with the males and females which they captured, and would beat and pound them against the stones before devouring them, while the larger ones would often make but one mouthful of them, swallowing wings and all! ”

“ They feed her and pet her, and she becomes very lazy. She does not even care to lay her eggs in a nice clean place.
The idle queen drops her eggs anywhere. The kind worker ants pick them up, and take them to a soft bedroom.
When there are too many young queens in one hill, they do not have a war, as the bees do. The workers settle the trouble, by taking off the wings of some of the young queens, and turning them into [Pg 15] work ants. This is done before the queens begin to lay eggs.
New-born ants and queens, who do not go out into the sunshine, are of a light color. The other ants are dark. ”

“ Experience has long ago taught him that to stray into the midst of a party of foraging ants is no slight matter. It would be like dancing an Irish jig over a nest of hornets. He is sure of being attacked, bitten, and stung by the venomous insects; and on hearing the call of the ant-thrush, he beats an instant retreat. The quadruped licking up his insect prey is a sight of less frequent occurrence. ”

“ Sometimes buildings had to be burned to get rid of them. The bite of these ants was so serious that after sixty years Anna still exhibits places on her feet where the ants left their indelible traces. Another of the ant pests was the Driver ant, so large, powerful and stubborn that even bodies of water did not stop them. They would join themselves together above the surface of the water and serve as bridges for the passage of the other ants. The Driver ants moved in swarms and their approach could be seen at great distances. ”

“ Most ants, indeed, will carry off the larvæ and pupæ of others if they get a chance; and this explains, or at any rate throws some light upon, that most remarkable phenomenon, the existence of slavery among ants. If you place a number of larvæ and pupæ in front of a nest of the horse ant, for instance, they are soon carried off; and those which are not immediately required for food remain alive for some days, though I have never been able to satisfy myself whether they are fed by their captors. ”

“ In many ants, especially those of tropical climates, the workers, again, are of two classes, whose structure and functions are widely different. In some species they are wonderfully unlike each other, and constitute two well-defined forms of workers. In others, there is a gradation of individuals between the two extremes. The curious differences in structure and habits between these two classes form an interesting, but very difficult, study. It is one of the great peculiarities of the Saüba ant to possess three classes of workers. ”

“ Still, although the ants of the old world are chiefly carnivorous, or feed on soft substances, and in consequence have not the least idea of hoarding food for the winter, there is one species of Brazilian ant which absolutely builds houses, prepares ground, sows seed, reaps the grain, and stores it away for future consumption. It is the Agricultural Ant, Atta malefaciens, first described by Dr. Lincecum, who watched the insect for twelve years before publishing an account that he knew would at first be received with incredulity. ”

“ By stroking the aphides with their antennæ they cause them to emit the sweet fluid, which the ants then greedily sip up. Various other insects are looked after by ants in a similar manner, or are found in their nests. It has been observed that some species, like the European Red Ant (Formīca sanguinĕa) , resort to violence to obtain working ants of other species for their own use, plundering the nests of suitable kinds of their larvæ and pupæ, which they carry off to their own nests to be carefully reared and kept as slaves. ”

“ The commonest of all the Indian ants, or at any rate the most conspicuous, are the black ones, to be found marauding on every sideboard, and whose normal state seems to be one of criminal trespass. These from their size are perhaps also the most interesting, as it requires little exertion to distinguish between the classes of individuals that in the aggregate make up a nest of ants. There is the blustering soldier, or policeman ant, who goes about wagging his great head and snapping his jaws at nothing ”

“ Who can describe the countless myriads of ants which swarm through the forests? Every shrub is full of creeping life, and the decayed vegetation affords harbor for some peculiar kinds of these insects. The large yellow puca-çiçi is seen in multitudes in the open air, and it even penetrates into the dwellings. This insect does not bite, but its crawling creates great irritation to the skin. The small black yana-çiçi, on the contrary, inflicts most painful punctures. A very mischievous species of stinging ant is the black sunchiron. ”

“ Some build their nests of clay in trees, and others hollow out abodes under the bark. They vary, too, in size and form. Some are half an inch long; some white, others red and black; some sting furiously. The ants inhabiting trees are those which commit depredations in houses chiefly. The most annoying of the species is the fire-ant—a little creature of a shining reddish colour. They live in the sand, where they form subterranean galleries covered by a sandy dome. They enter houses, and attack eatables of all sorts. ”

“ This operation required about half an hour, so frequently she paused to rest; but no sooner had she deserted her post than a swarm of cargador ants invaded the receptacle, and the first intimation we had of their presence was when a file of white kernels began to descend the side of the mortar and cross the floor at our feet. How the small insects are able to carry the large, heavy grains is a mystery. The burden weighs many times as much as the ant which bears it, and almost hides it from view. Later, we saw swarms of the same species at work in the clearing ”

“ I refer to the ordinary ant, of course; I have had no experience of those wonderful Swiss and African ones which vote, keep drilled armies, hold slaves, and dispute about religion. Those particular ants may be all that the naturalist paints them, but I am persuaded that the average ant is a sham. I admit his industry, of course; he is the hardest-working creature in the world—when anybody is looking—but his leather-headedness is the point I make against him. He goes out foraging, he makes a capture, and then what does he do? ”

“ Its head, flat and square, is armed with two moveable crooked horns, whose singular structure shews how admirable Nature is, even in the least of her works.
This insect is the most subtle and dangerous enemy the ant has; the plans which he forms to ensnare his prey, are very ingenious. He mines a portion of land in the form of a funnel, at the bottom of which he waits to seize the ants, which coming by chance to the edge of the precipice, are thence hurried down to their merciless foe. ”

“ The creature lives in the tree-tops and is diurnal in habits. It moves along the branches with great rapidity, either in an upright position or inverted like a sloth, the prehensile tail being used constantly. Ants form the food, and as these ascend even the highest trees, the little ant-eater has a never-failing and abundant supply; they are gathered up hurriedly as the little creature moves quickly along.
One day an army of carnivorous ants invaded our quarters while we were busily occupied preparing the specimens collected during the morning. ”

“ In the ants nest are males whose sole business is to perpetuate the species and die; females who are waited upon like peeresses in their own right, who neither toil nor spin, but are served by neutrals, labourers, who tend their innumerable eggs, nourish and unfold the larvæ, and in short, do all the duties of mothers, nurses, and menials. The author devised means to observe their internal economy; and he says—
"Let us now open the shutter which conceals from us the interior of the ant hill, and let us see what is passing there. ”

“ They have been known to starve to death rather than to feed themselves."
"But there are many respectable ants," objected Ben Gile, "and I will tell you how a well-regulated household behaves. One day last summer, when I was walking in the afternoon, I found myself suddenly surrounded by a cloud of winged insects—thousands and thousands of them. I caught one of them and found that it was a winged ant, for the males and queens have wings with which to fly away on their wedding journey. This journey lasts only a short time, and usually many colonies fly up together in the bright summer air. ”

“ Is it possible that the smaller ants are only slaves of the larger? Inscrutable are the ways of ants! However, when the advancing column had recovered from its confusion it formed up, and, wheeling round in most regular order, fell behind the rear-guard of the working column, and before dark not an ant remained outside except a dead body.
Soon after the last of its living comrades had disappeared, six ants, with a red one (dare I say?) "in command," came out and seemed to hold a somewhat fussy consultation round the corpse which had fallen on the line of march to the stump. ”

“ Yet those ants can exhibit inexplicable powers of communication, and a social organisation which has been the envy of many a philosopher, as he contrasts it with the chaos of human life. Ants charged with “Boom food,” ant communities of many thousands, all six feet high, might provide a considerable obstacle to the accepted supremacy of mankind. But the insect, however tiny, is becoming more and more to be recognised as one of the enemies of the human race. ”

“ There is an insidious and much dreaded insect with which the planters have to contend on the sugar and coffee plantations, but which is not met with in the cities; namely, the red ant, a much more formidable foe than any one not acquainted with its ravages would believe. These little creatures possess a power altogether out of proportion to their insignificant size, eating into the heart of the hardest wood, neither cedar, iron-wood, nor even lignum-vitæ being proof against them. They are not seen at the surface, as they never touch the outer shell of the wood whose heart they are consuming. ”

“ There is less interest in the habits of these destructive wretches than in all other of the ant tribe; they build stupendous nests, it is true, but their interior economy is less active and thrifty than that of many other species of ants, among which there is a greater appearance of the display of reasoning powers than in most animals of a superior class. ”

“ Belt believes, after much careful observation, that these ants protect the plant they live on from leaf-eating insects, especially from the destructive Saüba ants,—that they are in fact a standing army kept for the protection of the plant! This view is supported by the fact that other plants—Passion-flowers, for example—have honey-secreting glands on the young leaves and on the sepals of the flower-buds which constantly attract a small black ant. ”