2l6 



THE GUIDE TO NATURE. 



or other good glue and fasten it in 

 place along the top of the wall, then 

 turn it over the edge onto the bottom 

 of the foundation glass. In the same 

 way bind pieces on the ends, leaving 

 the door open. Now cut strips of Tur- 

 kish toweling an inch wide and the 

 same length as the glass strips, that is, 

 two ten inches, one four and one three 



PLAN OF A TWO-ROOM NEST. 

 a, nursery; b, food room; s, sponge. 



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PLAN OF THE CROSS SECTION OF THE NEST. 

 c, black cloth binding; d, Turkish toweling; e, card- 

 board cover; /, the dotted line represents the 

 rubber band around the nest; s, sponge. 



and a half inches long. Fold the long 

 edges of these pieces over until they 

 meet in the midline, leaving the rough- 

 est side of the toweling out. Smear 

 the tops of all the walls with glue and 

 fix the toweling on the walls with the 

 turned-in edges down. Lay the roof 

 glasses on the chambers ; they are sup- 

 ported by the toweling which permits 

 air to get in and serves to prevent the 

 ants from escaping if the cover is re- 

 moved for a moment, as they find its 

 rough surface difficult to crawl over. 

 Now place a bit of moist sponge as 

 large as your thumb nail in each room, 

 cover the roof glass with the card- 

 board squares which may be held in 

 place by rubber bands running around 

 the nest and the house is done. 



We must next secure our live stock. 

 I usually take a pint fruit jar when I 

 go out for ants. The wood ant, found 

 in decaying stumps, is a good one to 

 observe, or any of the larger kind that 

 live in the ground or under stones may 

 be used. When you have found a 

 colony of ants, dig into their nest until 

 you find the larvae or cocoons ; the 



latter egg-shaped, pale yellow objects 

 like small kernels of puffed rice, the 

 former, tiny white worms with one 

 end curved like a hook. Now scoop 

 up some of the ants and their larvae 

 and cocoons into the fruit jar, tie your 

 handkerchief or other cloth over the 

 mouth so they will not smother on the 

 way home. 



Now, how shall we induce the 

 ants to go into their new home? It is 

 a very simple matter and yet, until 

 you know how, it is a very difficult 

 task. I once told one of my nature 

 study classes to put the ants in the 

 nest and neglected to give them the 

 detailed directions how to do it. 

 When I returned to the room a few 

 minutes later it was to see a lot of 

 girls frantically shaking ants out of 

 their sleeves, boys chasing ants about 

 the floor or slapping their legs to stop 

 the progress of intruders, for ants are 

 quite as difficult to drive as the pro- 

 verbially obstinate pig and a good deal 

 more difficult to see when they do bolt 

 for liberty. Take a pan large enough 

 to hold the nest and leave some room 

 besides and place it in a still larger 

 pan. Put some water in this larger 

 pan so that the smaller one will be en- 

 tirely surrounded by water. Put the 

 nest in the smaller pan ; be sure that 

 the sponges are moist and the card- 

 board covers in place. Dump the con- 

 tents of the fruit jar down beside the 

 nest and leave it ; as the debris dries 

 out the ants will seek for themselves 

 and their young some dark, moist re- 

 treat and as the nest is just such a 

 place they will move their larvae and 

 cocoons to it. When they are com- 

 fortably settled, plug the entrance 

 doorway with some absorbent cotton 

 or a wad of cloth. Now the nest may 

 be kept anywhere. It is well not to 

 have more than twenty-five or so of 

 the ants and about the same number 

 of larvae and cocoons in one nest. 



We may now make one of the rooms 

 the feeding room ; remove the card- 

 board cover from over the roof glass 

 and take the sponge out of this room. 

 Put in a bit of peanut as large as a 

 bird seed or a crumb of sponge cake 

 moistened with honey or a shred of 

 raw meat. Any one of these makes 



