Ant scramble

'Way back in 2012, when we still lived in the Lower Mainland, I turned over a board in the vacant lot across the street, and discovered a colony of scurrying ants. I took photos and posted them on the blog that week, and went back a couple of times again to check on them. The last time, I took photos and a video.

Ants, pupae, and larvae in the blaze of unwanted sunlight.

Then my old software couldn't cope with the video, and I was busy, so I put it all aside for "later".

It is now later.

The ants scurried about grabbing pupae and larvae, hauling them here and there, seemingly with no notion of where to hide them until they found a hole leading underground. And of course, another dozen ants with their pupae were trying to cram them down the same hole, sometimes pushing out the one ahead of them in line. Somehow, somehow, they managed to get all the youngsters to safety. And then I carefully replaced their board roof, so they had to haul them all up the tunnels again.

The second and the third times I visited, the colony was thriving, so they coped with those brief episodes of glare and panic well. I wonder, though, if they didn't afterwards have ant nightmares.

On that first post, all those years ago, I wrote this:

Ant adults are like the stylish women of my grandmother's youth; their waists are too tightly constricted for good digestion, my grandmother's and her friends' with those tightly laced whalebone corsets (Nana, a teenager at the turn of the 20th century, boasted that she had an 18-inch waist; no wonder women had fainting spells!), the ants with a threadlike petiole that won't allow solid food to reach the digestive organs. Mature ants can only eat liquids.
The larvae are not so restricted, having no waists at all. So the worker ants bring them solid foodstuffs, which are pre-digested by the larvae, and harvested by the workers in liquid form. The system works, keeping the workers motivated, and the larvae well fed.

Some of the larvae are small; others are as large as, or even larger than the adults.They may be destined to be future queens.

The larvae have no legs but are capable of some minor movement, such as bending their head toward a food source when fed. During this stage, the level of care and nourishment the larvae receive will determine their eventual adult form. When resources are low, all larvae will develop into female worker ants; however, if the parent of a sexually reproducing colony has a plentiful supply of food, some of the larvae will receive better nourishment than others, and develop into winged, sexually mature female ants destined to leave the colony. (Wikipedia) 

A queen ant may live up to 30 years. I wonder if that old board is still lying in the vacant lot, with its busy city underneath.

2012 critter sampler

December 31st! Already? I'm still doing end-of-summer catch-up!

Alex Wild is curating "Best of 2012" science and nature shots on Scientific American. I was reminded, again, by BugGeek, who posted her collection. Beautiful shots; I've seen them all before, and will review them again tomorrow. Not tonight, because it's hard to blog when you're green with envy.

I looked over my photos, picking out the favourites, not to submit, but just as a year-end summary. And there were too many! I cut them down to just critters; still too many, and I kept remembering more. But I've finally trimmed the list down to a dozen favourite critters, not without difficulty.

Here's the collection: Critters only:

Ant nest uncovered, with the adults rushing to drag the larvae down the holes, out of sight.

Aphid in a moss forest

Caterpillar in morning sunlight

Garden snail, feeding on glass.

Grainy hand hermit, in human hand

Harvestman volunteer

I had trouble choosing my favourite of all the spiders. I have to smile at this fat mama, who does NOT like lime and pepper chips.

Life's an adventure. Hermit crab in aquarium.

Lazy moth in jar lid and morning sunshine.

Spider #2 Long-jawed orb weaver, on hosta leaf.

This was an exciting find; a molting ghost shrimp.

Ok, I give up; I can't choose just one or two spiders! Spider # 3, Ozyptila, the spider-eater's spider eater.

Spider #4, Mother toting her eggs.

Would have been #12, if I hadn't snuck a couple of extra spiders in there. Plume moth on outside wall.

And tomorrow is 2013! I never thought we'd get here. May it be a good year, the best year so far, for all of us!

Hideaway in a green field

In mid-May, we had a spell of spring weather, sunny and warmish. In between re-planting lettuce and searching out the slugs that ate my seedlings, I took a couple of quick trips across the street to the vacant lot.

The usual spring influx of earth-moving machinery hasn't materialized so far this year, and the field is looking green and inviting.

One of the very few sites managed by Ma Nature in our area.

The alders along the creek at the back are now high enough to hide the houses across the street. Scotch broom provides the accent colour of this season, yellow. The reds and blues will be along soon. Assorted birds are chattering in the shade; I heard one call I didn't recognize, and a robin came out to look me over, then returned to his foraging on the soggy creek bed. Dragonflies and cabbage whites danced over the tops of the greenery and spiders sunned themselves on the rocks.

Buttercups and daisies are starting to bloom.

I flipped over a board at the edge of the creek, and exposed a nest of suddenly-frantic ants.

Hundreds of white, shiny larvae, bigger than the adult workers caring for them.

Ant larvae lie mostly on their backs, hardly moving. The head end is hooked.

Ant adults are like the stylish women of my grandmother's youth; their waists are too tightly constricted for good digestion, my grandmother's and her friends' with those tightly laced whalebone corsets (Nana, a teenager at the turn of the 20th century, boasted that she had an 18-inch waist; no wonder women had fainting spells!), the ants with a threadlike petiole that won't allow solid food to reach the digestive organs. Mature ants can only eat liquids.

The larvae are not so restricted, having no waists at all. So the worker ants bring them solid foodstuffs, which are pre-digested by the larvae, and harvested by the workers in liquid form. The system works, keeping the workers motivated, and the larvae well fed.

I took a few quick photos and carefully replaced the board exactly as I had found it. Three days later, out looking for dragonflies, I stopped to check whether I'd disturbed the colony too much and forced them all to move. No; they were still there, and doing well:

Most of the larvae have eaten their fill and spun themselves a cocoon.

On the underside of the board. The cocoons are larger than the larvae.

This was four days ago. I haven't been out to see them since, because it's raining most of the time, but the cocoons should be ready to hatch (eclose) in about three weeks, depending on the species and the temperature. I'll make sure to drop in on them around that time.