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No. 2220
Anonymous
30th July 2013
Tuesday 5:45 pm
2220
>The ants would have been well prepared, Louisiana State University entomologist Linda Hooper-Bui explained to me. In their homeland the Pantanal floods happen annually, so they learned to raft. As waters rise, ants evacuate lower tunnels and move higher in their mound, eventually gathering on top. Using hooks, called tarsi, on the tips of their legs, ants latch onto one another and create rafts. Late-stage larvae are covered in hook-like hairs that trap air, encasing them in bubbles. Worker ants stack these larvae three to five thick, forming pontoons that keep the rafts afloat. They place the queen in the middle with pupae and early-stage larvae, which don’t have the crucial hairs to form the bubbles. Save the clumps of eggs workers carry in their jaws and a small amount of liquid food stored in their bodies that will last only a few days, the ants bring nothing aboard. Moreover, as the raft sets off, tipped into the water by the workers, they fling male alates overboard. If the raft is afloat longer than four days, the ants will begin to eat the brood—although not the ones used to make the raft. Rafts can hold together for as long as 21 days, surely long enough to survive the swollen Cumberland River.
http://nautil.us/issue/3/in-transit/ants-go-marching
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