ANT 270 



understood they are organs of smell as well, 

 and many a time when an ant seems to be 

 guided by its eyesight it is really dependent 

 on its sense of smell. In the diagram the 

 word antenna does not appear, but the two 



ANT 



-Scape 

 Lateral Eyes 



~ FVothorax 

 Mesothorax 



Tarsus 



PARTS OF AN ANT 



parts of it are named; the jointed part, which 

 looks like a string of little beads, is called the 

 flagellum, and the scape is the unjointed part. 



The other names in the diagram may at first 

 look forbidding, but a very little study will 

 make them clear. Femur, tibia, tarsus those 

 terms are familiar to anyone who has the 

 slightest acquaintance with anatomy, for in 

 human beings they are the names given to 

 the thigh-bone, the lower bone of the leg, and 

 the instep, with its many small bones; a glance 

 at the illustration will show that they are used 

 for corresponding parts of the ant's anatomy. 

 The three names which relate to the thorax 

 are very simple when it is understood that pro 

 means fore, or front; meso means middle, and 

 meta means hind, or after. 



The mandibles, or jaws, are not shown in the 

 illustration, but they are by no means unim- 

 portant in the ant's scheme of things. Numer- 

 ous indeed are the parts these mandibles are 

 called on to play; they serve as hands, for 

 the carrying of prey or other burdens; as 

 spades, as saws, as swords, as knives and forks 

 as any sort of implement or weapon, in fact; 

 of which the ant has need. 



How Ants Live. All this, while interesting 

 enough, is only preliminary to the really fas- 

 cinating question of the home-life of ants. 

 To be sure, all ants have not the same nesting 

 habits, any more than all birds; but of the 

 5,000 or more species that have been described, 



all are social that is, they live in colonies. 

 Most numerous of the ants in temperate 

 regions are those that make their nests in the 

 ground, and their mode of life will be described 

 here in some detail. 



The Nuptial Flight. Let us suppose that 

 we are watching an old, well-established com- 

 munity on a bright summer day. Some of tin 

 workers are busy about their regular tasks, 

 but many of them are running excitedly to 

 and fro, darting into the hole and then out 

 with no apparent purpose. Suddenly some- 

 thing happens. Out of the hole with a rush 

 come the gauzy-winged males and females,' 

 called forth not only by the warmth of the 

 sun but by some mysterious instinct which tells 

 them that mating time has come. Up and up' 

 they fly, until they are lost to sight and only 

 the strongest males are able to overtake the 

 fleeing queens. High in the air the mating 

 takes place; and then the joyous hour of flight 

 and romance is over, and both return to hum- 

 drum, earthy life. The male dies almost im- 

 mediately, and the female, realizing that never 

 again will she need her delicate wings, tears 

 them off or rubs them off. 



The New Colony. Some of the queens are 

 captured by the workers and borne back to 

 the communities from which they came, but 

 others found new colonies. The wingless 

 queen, who has never done any real work in 

 her life, now digs for herself a little burrow 

 in the soil, perhaps wearing away her mandibles 

 and maiming herself for life. Having hollowed 

 out a small chamber at the lower end of the 

 burrow, she closes the opening completely, and 

 remains underground, without food, for month 

 after month. The first eggs she lays become 

 in time tiny legless grubs, or larvae, which 

 are perfectly helpless and must be cared for by 

 the queen. She feeds them with secretions 

 from her own body, until very slowly they 

 pass to the next stage, becoming cocoons, or 

 pupae. These in time become worker ants, 

 perfectly formed but very small minims, they 

 are called; and the queen's days of caring for 

 her offspring are then over, for the little work- 

 ers relieve her from all her tasks, save that 

 of egg-laying. 



The Nest. They dig a real nest, with branch- 

 ing galleries leading to chambers of various 

 sizes, and there then appears the opening at 

 the surface of the soil and the familiar crater- 

 shaped ant-hill, formed of the tiny pellets of 

 soil which are brought to the surface. In some 

 of the chambers food is stored; in others are 



