foraging ant and more - macros #314

Ants are definitely an amazing masterpiece created by Mother Nature. Sadly, in the metropolis where I live I cant observe ants in the natural environment. Happily, we dont have ants and redroaches in our house. Yes, when it comes to nature's creatures not everything was created for human's pleasures to benefit our needs. If you didnt ever have ants in your house, believe me: it is no good! I had such a house full of living force in my past. It is no good. You better go to watch the outside!

And again, happily, I had such an opportunity this summer. You will be surprised to hear this, but I didnt have any anthills pictures in my pocket. Well, this happens. One cannot embrace everything. But I have a few macro pics to share, one session happened to be very intresting: I witnessed a worker foraging ant with his trophy - a big yellow buggie.

The Guide 'Insects of USSR, European part. Vol.3' states there could occure 30 species at my location:

Myrmica rubra
Myrmica ruginodis
Myrmica rugulosa
Myrmica lobicornis
Leptothorax acervorum
Leptothorax muscorum
Harpagoxenus sublaevis
Formicoxenus nitidulus
Camponotus herculeanus
Formica pressiladris
Formica exsecta
Formica suecica
Formica forsslundi
Formica cinerea
Formica picea

Formica gagatoldes
Formica uralensis
Formica sanguinea
Formica cunicularia
Formica rufibardis
Formica rufa
Formica polyctena
Formica truncorum
Formica lugubris
Formica aquilonia
Lasius niger
Lasius flavus
Lasius umbratus
Lasius mixtus
Lasius fuliginosus

Probably, that book is outdated to some point: with the global warming thing, the state of things, the figures might have changed a bit upwards. The ant I had my pleasurable encounter with, probably was from Formica rufa specie. They are very wide-spread here.

Looking at my ant during his travel with his trophy, I managed to find out that:

• the color is dark brown (orange, dirty and dark), head and belly are darker then legs
• it has one head equipped with antennas
• it has no hands
• it has 6 legs
• antennas are as long as its legs
• it may use its mouth (helitzers, actually) to hold its trophey

• it can hold, lift and carry on the weight, not dragging on the ground - a weight that sufficiently exceeds its own. (in this certain case, the ant made its way over rough terrain, and not along the smoothly paved autobahn).
• also I should note the ant was not easy to scare and make it abandon its prey.

• the ant can go backwards - like on the photo below.

• also he has a glossy belly and all other parts including body and head, are matte. I didnt forget this, the last, but not the least.

• I didnt notice what it was using his antennas for, but I have heard ants need them to find the way home, to check the marks and signs left by other ants, etc. I didnt conduct an experiment to cut off these antennaes just to see, if it will find or loose the way home without antennas.

In this picture you see a bug, swimming in a little artificial pond. What does it doing there, you may ask? Well, thats me to blame for his swimming photosession... I tried to cool him down -- tried this as a solution to decrease its crazy activity, otherwise it was not possible to take any decent pics.

And how do you solve this problem? Shy, smarty, speedy beetles and various critters?

A few pics as a bonus, from the neighbouring folder.

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All images taken by me, copyright (c) @qwerrie

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