[ExI] ants again

The Avantguardian avantguardian2020 at yahoo.com
Tue Jul 1 08:42:40 UTC 2008


--- spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:

> Today I noticed something even more curious.  Most of the ants were gone!
> Still skerjillions of them on the ground milling about, but the trees had
> only perhaps 10 to 20 percent of the original number.  So all I can figure
> is that ants apparently fall out of their trees.  I don't know where else or
> how else they would be going?  Ideas?

Keen observation, Spike. Unfortunatly these guys beat you to it by a few years:
http://berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2005/02/09_ants.shtml

>  
> If they routinely fall out of the trees upon which they farm, and just go
> around and climb back up, and if now they cannot get back up, and 80 to 90
> percent are gone after two days, then it is close enough first order
> estimate that any given ant falls from the tree about once a day on average
> or slightly more often.  

According to the article, they fall off at will to avoid predators for example.
The Peruvian species mentioned in the article apparently even glide to some
degree, making 180 turns in midair to land on the same tree further down.
 
> Did anyone here know, or did you ever observe ants falling from trees?
> Perhaps we just weren't setting up the experiment correctly, or it is too
> difficult to see ants falling from trees.  If an ant falls an average of
> about once a day, and I set up a piece of white cardboard under the tree on
> a platform that disallows ants from coming up from below, I should be able
> to observe an ant falling upon the cardboard at a rate of a couple per
> minute, ja? 

Perhaps the wind is a factor? It would be interesting to see whether they are
falling off by accident or purposely jumping. It would be cool if the species
you are watching can glide like Cephalotes atratus.

It does make a lot of sense to me too. Ants are essentially eusocial wingless
wasps. The queens and drones in fact do have wings until they mate. So even
without wings, a worker ant probably has most of the other "flight
instrumentation" so to speak. 
  
> I always assumed that the ants protect the aphids.  So what if now the ants
> fall out of the tree, but the aphids don't?  Would I expect to see big mean
> ladybugs show up and begin to devour the unprotected aphids?

Yes. Or the green lacewing whose larvae are called "aphid lions". Ladybug
larvae are sometimes called "aphid alligators" because the kind of do look like
little black alligators with orange markings. Lions and alligators, oh my.
:-)  

> Or would the
> ladybugs just assume the presence of ants and go elsewhere?  Any ideas? 

Advertising? I am just kidding but it will probably take some time. Adult
ladybugs would probably have to mate and lay eggs on your trees for a few
generations to really make a dent in a formerly well-tended herd of aphids.
Also the larvae of both ladybugs and lacewings are more voracious than the
adults.

I wouldn't leave it to chance. Army ants in the Amazon Rainforest build bridges
out of their own bodies to cross piranha-filled rivers so I wouldn't put it
past your ants to eventually figure out a way around your "ring o' sticky
doom". If want to take advantage of the window of opportunity, you can buy
ladybugs and green lacewings here for about $15. 

http://www.gardensalive.com/search.asp?ss=green+lacewings&eid=092706GA&sid=143369&gclid=CLmShr2UnpQCFR0ZagodMUsvtg&bhcd2=1214897007

http://www.gardensalive.com/product.asp?pn=5065&ss=ladybugs
 
> Granted the extropic angle of this particular topic is tenuous at best, so
> feel free to reply offlist if this interests you, or post here until the
> drones start to complain.  

Considering that drones only live long enough to mate with the queen, why give
them any say in this? ;-) Actually I could make a case for aphids being
appropriate for the list but I will leave that as an exercise for the reader.

Hint: it has to do with the females.



Stuart LaForge
alt email: stuart"AT"ucla.edu

"In ancient times they had no statistics so that they had to fall back on lies."- Stephen Leacock


      



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