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Ant trails June 13, 2018

June 13, 2018

One of the easy cool things to see at La Selva are leafcutter ant trails. They’re not quite everywhere, but they’re very common, especially along the edges of human trails. The ants fill the space so uniformly they might as well be obeying road signs declaring that particular strip of concrete or earth a designated ant lane. (The trails are certainly “painted” with pheromones, but I’m not sure how the ants know to put them right along the edges.)

Right now, the trail outside the lab I’m spending most of my time in looks particularly cool because the ants are mostly carrying tiny fig fruits rather than leaves. That makes it easier to see the trail over long distances. (It’s the reddish-brown line along the right side of the trail continuing into the distance.)

I was going to post a video that’s almost shot from an ant’s eye view, but it looks like WordPress wants to charge me for that. So I’ve put it on YouTube.