ants

[lucy24]

True story.

A few days ago I noticed a scattering of ants in my kitchen. Eventually I found the end of the trail at, predictably, the honey bottle; the beginning was at the back door.

This means the ants had to:
find their way to the second floor (they’d already done this part, because the hummingbird feeder drips)
come in under the back door (at ant scale, a cavernous tunnel)
traverse 6ft of baseboard
climb to the top of the counter
walk along several feet of counter
climb up one more level to a shelf
traverse the shelf
walk a further distance to the bottom edge of a cabinet
traverse the cabinet, including turning two corners
get inside the cabinet door
climb up to a higher shelf
navigate the saucer on which the honey bottle is sitting

How the heck did* they do this?

* Past tense because they’re not doing it any more. I put an ant trap midway, and made a moat for the honey bottle.

[NickMNS]

How the heck did* they do this?

A random walk.

Many ants leave the nest and scatter randomly. When an ant finds a source of food (by luck*) the ant leaves a faint scent trail behind as brings the food back to the nest. Other ants, leaving the nest or randomly walking fall upon this faint scent trail and follow it to the source of food, and then contribute more scent to the trail as they return to the nest. As intensity of the scent increases more ants are drawn to it. The intensity of the scent trail signals to the ants the importance of the food source. As such, an important food source, like your pot of honey, will attract a large portion of ants from the nest.

Recognize this pattern from somewhere outside of biology?

Not sure where I heard or saw this explanation, but here is a video explaining how they use scent to navigate.
[youtube.com...]


*by luck:
The ant nest is likely located in some nearly optimal location in terms of distance to food sources, so not much luck is needed. The probability that find food in any direction is likely high.

Ants are really fascinating creatures. Are ants individual creatures or is a nest one creature made up a detached distributed network of workers?

One final point:

This means the ants had to:
find their way to the second floor...

There is a pretty good probability that the nest is located in wall on the second floor. The likey the warmth of the house and the proximity to food.


[edit] forgot to specify the return to the nest.

[not2easy]

Been there, done that. More than once, sorry to say. How they do it is to send out scouts, like bees do. Any(!) success starts a trail. They secrete an acid trail to their find and the colony follows it until it is gone or they are interrupted (good move).

I try to follow to the source and leave them a treasure closer to home. There are two kinds of ants: sweet eating and protein hunters. I leave a mix of bacon fat and sugar, laced with boric acid powder. I use an old aluminum soda can. Cut it in half across the diameter and coarsely 'fringe' the raw edges so it can be nicely closed to the elements but open enough for ants. I stake it down with a bamboo kebab skewer so stray critters don't walk off with it. It takes a few days to work on them so they have time to take it home and feed the queen. It works.

I used to have fire ants that were kind enough to show me where they lived by putting out a new hill after a good rain. I was generous with housewarming gifts. ;)

[lucy24]

laced with boric acid powder

My father used to lace honey or syrup with arsenic and leave it near an ant route. (He was a chemistry professor, and simply bummed it off a colleague.) They took it home, fed it to their young, and after a while there were no more ants.

Yes, this is the same father who would set out containers of stagnant water at the beginning of the warm season. Old aquariums, spare tires, that kind of thing. As soon as mosquitoes came by and laid their eggs--or, at most, when the eggs hatched into aquatic larvae--he went out and dumped the water.

:: rub hands, cackling gleefully ::

[not2easy]

Lol..it was a co-worker, a seasoned old chemist that carefully explained how and why the boric acid worked. I'm sure arsenic would be as effective, but it is harder to get.

I should mention that I have no nearby neighbors or children around who might fool around with my ant answers. That might require more care.

[tangor]

Boric acid is very safe around humans and pets, though if ingested or left on the skin, or inhaled, it might cause nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, rarely fatal (depending on amounts ingested!)

I use it in my kitchen, back of the cabinets, under the stove and refrigerator, bath, bedrooms, and work areas (computer stuff) in the tablet form. No more than 12 per room, renewing every three to four months, depending on how rapidly they are consumed (ants, roaches, silverfish).

That said, I still wear gloves when messing with the stuff, and immediately wash hands after planting the stuff.

Works a treat and is very safe.

Arsenic? Not so much! My granddad used it to take out moles and prairie dogs tearing up his yard, but those were different times and different ways.

[engine]

Thats amazing they can find their way to that foodsource, lucy24

Ants; they are great little creatures and clear up debris in the wild. As soon as they arrive in our homes we want to stop them. Hygiene issues are probably the worst aspect to consider.

In my experience, the best way to deal with them is to keep surfaces and runs clean, and, unless they are nesting in your house, to run a barrier around the house. Generally, they won't cross these barriers, and then there's no need to use stronger methods. Barriers include citrus and vinegar. The ant scouts hate the very strong scent from those substances and will trundle off in another direction without entering the house.

[lucy24]

Recognize this pattern from somewhere outside of biology?

In fact it put me in mind of when I had pet rats that were largely free-range. (They knew how to make the cats keep their distance.) Venturing out to an unfamiliar place was a slow, hesitant process--but coming home again took no time at all. And then all the other rats would confidently follow the newly created trail.

Since the honey bottle already sits in a saucer to keep the shelf clean, it was only a matter of pouring a little water into the saucer. Ants, unlike rats, can’t swim.

[lucy24]

Postscript: I neglected to keep the moat filled, and the ants came back. I cleaned up, moved the honey--and then had to go somewhere, so I wasn't able to stick around and eavesdrop and learn the Ant for “You dirty lying sneak, there’s no honey! I just hiked ten yards for nothing!”

[engine]

Aha! You didn't clean up the scent they laid, either.