XXVI INSECTA : HYMENOPTERA 425 



they form an undergrourid nest with many large well- venti- 

 lated chambers. Then they sally forth and begin to cut 

 large pieces out of the leaves of adjacent trees, carrying 

 these back to the nest, where they ^ 



are cut up into small pieces, making a 

 loose spongy mass. This is then made 

 to adhere either to the roof or the 

 floor of the chambers, different species 

 of ants having different customs in this 

 matter. The whole mass is soon held 

 together by the white threads (hyphae) 



of a fungus which develops rapidly in 



4.v,„ 1 f 1 fi i- ^1, 1, 1, Fig. 319.— Five Chambers 



the leaf pulp ; after a time the hyphae f„^ t^e nest of a Leaf. 



produce at their tips small white cutting Ant in which 



bodies. It is for the sake of these, ap- ^'^^ '^'^^^^ f'^^s^s is 



parently, that the fungus is cultivated, flftlr Wheeler.""^ 



for they form the only, or at any rate 



the chief food of the ants ; moreover, it is apparently only 



when tended by the ants that these little white heads are 



formed. As soon as the fungus is well developed in the 



spongy masses, the larvae are distributed throughout it and 



are fed on it. 



The way in which these fungus-gardens originate in new 



colonies has recently been brought to light.^ It has been 



shown that the young queen, when she goes out for her 



marriage flight, has always in her infra-buccal pocket (see 



p, 411) a little pellet of the fungal food, and that when she 



founds her new colony she ejects this pellet, and with it starts 



her vegetable garden the day after she enters the earth. On 



the third day she lays her eggs, and for the next five or 



six weeks she divides her time between egg-laying, cleaning 



and nursing the little grubs that hatch out, feeding them 



on other eggs, and tending her kitchen-garden, apparently 



watering and manuring the fungUs vfiih secretions from her 



own body. By the time the first batch of workers appears, 



the fungus is in a condition to be eaten, and it forms their 



food, though they still feed the larvae on eggs. Finally, 



about seven weeks after the founding of the colony, some 



of the workers make their way out of the earth, and begin 



' A. von Ihering, Die AnUtge neuer Oolonien und Pilzgarten lei Atta 

 sexdens (1898). 



