BY HENRY TRYON. L55 
As illustrating the wide bearings of the subject of harvesting 
ants it may be of interest to remark that Mr. Moggridge 
approached it not as an entomologist, but as a botanical student. 
Having casually noticed the habit, he was prompted to make 
the observations detailed in his work, by the consideration that 
such habits in ants might be related to the sudden occurrence 
of plants in certain localities where they had not before been 
met with, and especially on soil which had been thrown up in 
digging; the late Mr. Bentham having already, in 1869, 
directed attention to the little information existing on the 
origin of plants in such situations.* Nor was Mr. Moggridge 
led to his investigations, in the first instance, by the purpose of 
corroborating the testimony of ancient writers; for he only 
afterwards learnt that European authorities, on the habits of 
ants, had discredited their statements. 
That this Brisbane harvesting ant also, is an important agent 
in the local dispersion of plants—especially weeds—and is con- 
nected with their sudden appearance on heaps of soil excavated 
from a depth, is sufficiently demonstrated in the following obser- 
vations. The ants of one nest were noticed to be harvesting the 
seeds of Portulaca oleracea, Linn.,and of Amaranthus viridis, Linn. 
—both common weeds, and growing at a comparative distance 
from the nest. These seeds had remained stored upin their nest for 
some time, when rain suddenly came on, and under its influence 
the seeds—especially those of the latter plant—commenced to 
germinate. Of those which had already thrown out a radicle, 
this was bitten off and brought to the surface; some of these 
* On the occasion on which Mr. Bentham directed attention to this 
state of things he referred to as a supposition only, the statement of 
Alphonse de Candolle that: “Il faut done regarder la couche de terre 
végétate d’ un pays comme un magazin de graines au profit des espéces 
indigénes,”+ since no direct evidence of the existence of subter- 
ranean stores of seeds had been met with, neither by himself nor by 
any one whose recorded observation he had seen. Proc. Lin. Soc., Lond. 
Presidential Address, May, 24th, 1869. + |Geographie Botanique Raisonée, 
p. 625. Paris, 1855]. . 
