Grissell is an expert on wasps [...]]]> What is there to do when the ants are not very active outside? Read a book about ants, of course. I just finished Bees, Wasps, and Ants: The Indispensable Role of Hymenoptera in Gardens by Eric Grissell, which James Trager had mentioned a few weeks ago (Thank you, James!) 

Grissell is an expert on wasps and he writes with a great deal of humor, so this is an interesting read. Although it is geared to the popular audience, and gardeners in general, there’s plenty to please the entomologist as well. I definitely benefited from a brush up on the sawflies, which I hadn’t spent much time on in awhile.

Starting out with an overview of the Order Hymenoptera, what groups make it up and what their economic impact is, Grissell then goes into detail about each group. He calls the sawflies “cows,” the parasitoids “police,” predatory wasps “wolves,” bees are “pollinators, of course, and ants are “recyclers.”

I found his take on the ants to be quite amusing. “The main trouble with ants is, well, basically they all look like ants…” (p. 237). This is from a man who studies parasitoids! Anyway, this may explain why Figure 131 on page 256 is labeled Formica. Just sayin’… (Actually those things often happen in the editorial process.)

Anyway, I did find this view insightful because I have made a New Year’s resolution to figure out our local Pogonomyrmex, and I have to say right now I have a lot of photographs of reddish-orange ants that all look alike:  blurry.

Seriously though, Grissell laments that when gardeners talk of adding wildlife to the garden, they always concentrate on birds and butterflies. Perhaps this book will convince more people to tolerate, if not actively encourage, the bees, wasps and ants.

Hardcover: 336 pages
Publisher: Timber Press (June 30, 2010)
ISBN-10: 0881929883
ISBN-13: 978-0881929881

Here is Chandler, Arizona the temperatures the day this was taken ranged from a low of 45° F (7° C) to a high of 78° F (26° C). What are the ants doing here?

Any activity at this Pogonomyrex harvester ant nest?

Can you [...]]]> In the last post, I looked at carpenter ants overwintering in upstate New York.

Here is Chandler, Arizona the temperatures the day this was taken ranged from a low of 45° F (7° C) to a high of 78° F (26° C). What are the ants doing here?

Any activity at this Pogonomyrex harvester ant nest?

Can you see the ant coming out of the nest entrance?

Looks like a bit of housecleaning.

Most of the workers were coming out of the nest carrying debris.

The ants were moving about six to eight inches from the entrance and depositing.

What are ants doing where you live?

The temperatures were hovering around freezing in upstate New York, where I was helping someone spit firewood.

When the wood split, occasionally we would find tunnels, hardly more than grooves in the wood, packed with ants. Although the ants look like they [...]]]> Last week I got a peek at where Camponotus pennsylvanicus carpenter ants spend the winter.

The temperatures were hovering around freezing in upstate New York, where I was helping someone spit firewood.

When the wood split, occasionally we would find tunnels, hardly more than grooves in the wood, packed with ants. Although the ants look like they might have been moving, they were mostly stiff and inactive. You could shake them out onto the ground without much resistance.

This group was in softer wood with more decay. Notice the larva. Most of the clusters of worker ants had small larvae with them.

Camponotus carpenter ants that live in temperate climates enter a state of slowed metabolism, called “diapause”, in the late fall and through the cold parts of the winter. Generally, the queen stops laying eggs. The workers begin to aggregate more than before. The workers develop large fat bodies, which can be seen as their gasters swell in size, as well as produce glycerol. Glycerol is an alcohol that helps prevent the formation of ice crystals within the ants’ bodies. No wonder the ants stagger a bit when they try to move.

What are ants doing this month where you live?

For more information try:

Cannon, C. A. 1990. Demography, cold hardiness, and nutrient reserves of overwintering nests of the carpenter ant, Camponotus pennsylvanicus (De Geer). M. S. Thesis, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. 165 pp.

Cannon, C.A. and R.D. Fell. 1992. Cold hardiness of the overwintering black carpenter ant. Physiol. Entomol. 17:121-126.

Circus of the Spineless is a blog carnival that started in 2005 to bring together bloggers who have an interest in animals without backbones. We’re hosting #69 here at Wild About Ants this month, and would love to see a recent post [...]]]> Do you ever blog about invertebrates? Have you heard about Circus of the Spineless?

Circus of the Spineless is a blog carnival that started in 2005 to bring together bloggers who have an interest in animals without backbones. We’re hosting #69 here at Wild About Ants this month, and would love to see a recent post from you. Just send an email with your link to wildaboutants (at) gmail (dot) com and put “Circus of the Spineless” in the subject line.

Whether they crawl, swim, squirt or slither, send your posts this way! Edit:  If you could get them to me before Jan. 1, that would be great.

To see past carnivals:

Last month’s carnival was at Dave Hubble’s Ecology Spot.

#55 was here, called Museum of Invertebrate Art

The information for the  2012 Ant Course is already up at the California Academy of Sciences website. It will be 2012 August 6-16, at the Makerere University Biological Field Station in [...]]]> Somehow wouldn’t you think the Ant Course 2011 at South Western Research Station in Portal, AZ would be a a bit more serious than this?

The information for the  2012 Ant Course is already up at the California Academy of Sciences website. It will be 2012 August 6-16, at the Makerere University Biological Field Station in Kibale Forest, Uganda. Time to start working on your passport.

This is the day after Thanksgiving.

Funny, the leafcutters were moving very slowly at much higher temperatures over a month before.

Look Inside an Ant Nest (Pebble Plus: Look Inside Animal Homes) by Megan Nicole Cooley Peterson is a straightforward nonfiction book that explores the unseen world of an ant nest. Laid out with large color photographs on the right [...]]]> Today let’s take a look at a children’s book about ants with suggestions for accompanying hands-on activities.

Look Inside an Ant Nest (Pebble Plus: Look Inside Animal Homes) by Megan Nicole Cooley Peterson is a straightforward nonfiction book that explores the unseen world of an ant nest. Laid out with large color photographs on the right side page and simple sentences with controlled, subject-specific vocabulary on the left, it is perfect for the beginning reader (first grade reading level). The large size also makes it easy to hold up and read in front of a group of young children. One of the photographs is by Alex Wild, the rest are from stock sources.

Suggested activities to accompany the book:

1. Ant life cycle

Gather:

• Construction paper
• Crayons and or markers
• Photographs of ant eggs, ant larvae, ant pupae, ant workers, and ant queens (see links below)

Have the children draw each stage, keeping in mind:

1. Only the queen lays the eggs in most cases. (how to tell if the ant is a queen)
2. The larvae are legless and resemble a comma or crochet hook in shape (more photos of larvae.)
3. The eggs are smaller than the workers; the pupae are the same size as the workers or larger. (Is it an egg or a pupa?)
4. Pupae are sometimes covered with a silken bag called a cocoon and sometimes not, depending on the ant species.
5. Adult ants emerge from the pupae. Worker pupae are the same size as the workers. Queen and male pupae are larger than the average worker.

For older children, let them construct the life cycle in 3D, for example using marshmallow ants.

2. Ant nests

Dr. Walter Tschinkel has modified a technique for looking at the structure of ant nests by pouring dental plaster or various metals, such as aluminum, into the tunnels, allowing it to dry and then digging up the nest. This gives a negative-space impression of some truly impressive ant nests.

This amazing video shows how it is done by experts. (Do not try this at home).

More about Dr. Walter Tschinkel’s Ant Castles can be found at the Florida State University. He’s says that the ants can build the huge one at the bottom in just five days!

Suggestions:

1. Draw pictures of some of Walter Tschinkel’s amazing ant nest casts. Label the chambers and tunnels.

2. For older students: Design and draw plans for an underground home for humans. What would be the advantages of living underground? What might some of the problems be? Try drawing up your plans on Google Sketchup or a similar program.

Reading level: Ages 4 and up
Library Binding: 24 pages
Publisher: Capstone Press (August 1, 2011)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1429660783
ISBN-13: 978-1429660785

Book was provided by publisher for review purposes.

This video shows you what you need to do:

The contest will end December 18, [...]]]> Are you into programming as well as ants? The you might want to take a look at the Fall 2011 AI Challenge, sponsored by Google. It’s all about, you guessed it, ants! Create artificial intelligence and watch ant colonies fight. It’s win-win.

This video shows you what you need to do:

The contest will end December 18, 2011 at 11:59pm EST.

Let us know how your colony does if you give it a try.

Any ideas what is going on here? I’ll give you a hint:  The photograph was taken in Tucson.