PARASITES 17 



ANT. No, you prefer snails. 



DOROTHY. Why did you take that live bug back that 

 was trying to get out of your house today? 



ANT. Some kinds of ants keep beetles that they will 

 not allow out of the house. They get something they like 

 from the backs of the bugs in some cases, but may keep 

 others for pets, like you do your cats, dogs, parrots, and 

 canaries. 



DOROTHY. You depend mainly on grain for a living, 

 and so are not very good hunters for live game. Still, I 

 saw you capture a fly and another small insect. I .suppose 

 that ants never catch the small cockroaches that live with 

 them? 



ANT. No, but they get used to them sooner than you do. 



DOROTHY. I see you have carried home the bodies of 

 cucumber bugs, beetles, earwigs, bees, grasshoppers, sow 

 bugs, flies and worms. 



Parasites. 



ALBERT. Is there room on your body for another 

 animal to live? 



ANT. Plenty of it. A mite fastens itself to the body 

 of a certain ant with its sticky feet, moves to the right 

 place, and helps itself to food as it is passed from one ant 

 to another, or to a baby. 



FLORENCE. Do parasites ever get on the baby? 



ANT. A certain baby fly wraps its long neck around 

 that of the baby ant, leaving the heads of the two side by 

 side. You see what will happen every time the baby ant 

 eats. This kind of an ant baby spins a cocoon. 



FLORENCE. Then what becomes of the baby fly? 



ANT. It slips down to the foot of the bed, and so is 

 included in the ant baby's cocoon. 



