55 2 
Saw-flies, Gall-flies, Ichneumons, 
organisms, or make necessary the assumption that ants have a choice-making 
and generally adaptive and teachable intelligence. Can ants dislocate in 
time their reactions to stimuli ? Are ants conscious ? 
Curious interrelations of ants with some other animals have already 
been referred to, as their care of plant-lice 
(Aphididae) from which they obtain the much- 
liked honey-dew, and their association with various 
species of their own general kind in the rela¬ 
tions of slave-maker and slave, host and parasite, 
or host and guest. But still another kind of inti¬ 
mate association with other animal species is com¬ 
mon in ant-life, namely, that of the occurrence in 
their nests of many different species of other in¬ 
sects (as well as certain mites, spiders, and myri¬ 
apods) which force their presence on their ant 
hosts by cleverness or deception, or are tolerated 
or even encouraged by the hosts. A few of these 
arthropods which inhabit ants’ nests are true para¬ 
sites or predaceous enemies, such as have to be 
endured by almost all other insect kinds, but the 
large majority of these so-called myrmecophiles do 
little or no injury to their ant hosts, while a few 
even return in some degree the advantages which 
they receive by the association. These advantages are (a) ready-made 
subterranean cavities and lodging-places, defended against most enemies by 
the fierce and capable owners 
of the nest; ( b) a pleasant 
and favorable temperature 
maintained despite the frigid 
ity of the outer atmosphere; 
( c ) stores of vegetable food, 
as seeds, etc., garnered by 
the ants, and supplies of ani- Fig 756> FiG- 757# 
mal food, as bits of freshly Fiq ^ _ Termitogaster texanai a rove -beetle 
W (Staphylinidse), which lives in the nests of the 
termite, Eutermes cinereus, in Texas. (After 
Brues; natural length i| mm.) 
and pupae, and even the dead Yig. 7 57 —Mnigmatis blattoides, a Phorid fly, which 
bodies of the ants themselves; lives in the nests of the ant, Formica fusca, in 
. _ . . . ,. ., r , Denmark. (After Meinert; thirteen times natural 
(d) the sweetish liquid food size ^ 
readily regurgitated by most 
ant workers in response to certain stimuli, and normally used for feeding 
the queens, males, and occasionally other workers: and finally ( e ) means 
Fig. 755. —Ecitoxenia brevi- 
pes , a rove-beetle (Staphy- 
linidae), which lives in the 
nests of the robber-ant, 
Eciton schmittii, in Texas. 
Note absence of wings and 
curiously modified shape. 
(After Brues; natural 
length one-eighth inch.) 
killed insects, etc., collected by 
the hosts, as well as the larvae 
