The Osceola times., 1880-09-04
A LIVING H0NEYC0MB.

A LIVING HONEYC0MB.
The Uoney-bearing Ant Of New Mexico-A
Perambulating sweetmeat.
Journal of Science.
Much as has been written about the
marvels of instinct, there are still dis
coveries of great interest TO be made IN
this prolific field. Particularly in the
domain of those insect Yankees, the
ants, with their wonderful ingenuity
and human-like manners and customs,
there is room for extended observa-
tions.
Some lately discovered facts in rela-
ton 10 them are so curious and interest
ing that it may be advisable to give
them greater publ icity than they have
yet obtained. Some of these facts have
long been known to the world Of science,
but not to the public. Others are new
discoveries. As a whole, they form one
of the most surprising chapters in the
history of animal life and contrivance.
Varied as are the social habits of the
ants, it is generally considered that the
social bees surpass them in one particu-
lar. namely, their mode of storing sup
plies OF winter food, the storehouses OF
ant-food having no contrivance similar
in ingenuity to the honeycomb, with its
supply of the sweets of life.
But the truth is that certain tribes OF
ants are well aware of the value of ma
lures sweetmeats as articles of food, and
have developed mode of storing up
their winter honey still more curious
than that practised by the bees.
They possess, in fact, what may he
called living honeycombs, perambulatory
cells filled with distilled sweetness. We
refer to the honey-bearing ants of New
Mexico, concerning which some very
interesting facts have been brought TO
light.
Rev. DR.. McCook of Philadelphia,
noted observer of ants and ant-life, has
been interviewing these honey-bearers,
and his results differ so widely from the
ordidary facts of insect instinct that they
cannot but prove of general interest.
These ants had been previously known
only in New Mexico, but he discovered
them in Colorado, inhabiting the local
ity known as the Garden of the Gods"
their nests being excavated in the stony
crests of low ridges which run through
this mountain-girt paradise.
The ridges are composed of a friable
sandstone, into which our minute ma
sons mine deeply digging galleries which
sometimes run for several feet into the
rock. The nest, outwardly, is some ten
inches in diameter by from two to three
and half inches in height, composed of
sand and bits of stone carried from with
in. some OF which seem large enough to
defy a regiment of ants to move them.
Inside the nests successive chambers
are excavated, connected by galleries,
the floors of the chambers being COM
paratively smooth, while the ceilings
are left in rough state. But this rough
ness is no evidence of carelessness in
the builder. 1t has, on the contrary, an
important object; this is to furnish foot
hold for the clinging feet of certain ex-
traordinary-looki creatures. which
form the living honeycombs of which
We have spoken.
Fancy an animal with the head and
thorax of small ant, but with all the
posterior portion of the body converted
into a round sac, of the size of large
pea, and of rich, translucent amber
hue-it being, in fact, distended into a
reservoir of honey. This honey bag is
immense when compared with the size
of the ant, the unchanged parts of which
might pass for a black pins head at
tached to the side of marrow-fat pea.
These odd looking creatures cling to the
roof of the chamber with their feet. the
distended honey bag hanging downward
like an amber globe. On seeing them
we instinctively imagine that their leg
muscles must be developed in a fashion
to put to shame those of human athletes,
since it is no light weight which they
are thus forced to continuously sup
port.
In each chamber of the nest about
thirty honey-bearers are found, making
some 800 TO complete the nest. Besides
these are hundreds or thousands of 9th.
els, workers and soldiers, lords and
queens, to whom the honey bearers
serve as storehouses of winter food.
DIR. McCook succeeded in bringing
some of these home with him alive, pro-
viding them with nest building mater
ials, and with sugar for nutriment. He
has one very interesting nest in a glass
bottle, with the interior chamber well
displayed. The roof of this is covered
with depending globules of honey, so
large as to almost conceal the minute
clineing insect of which they really form
a part.
But the marvellous feature of the case
vet remains to be described. Not only
is the abdomen of the ant converted
into receptacle for honey, but the
whole internal economy of the body is
transformed for this purpose. All the
organs of the abdomen have quite dis
appeared; viscera, nerves, veins, arter-
les, have alike disappeared; and there
remains only thin transparent skin,
which is capable of great distention. 1t
is thus i'll reality honey-cell, and much
str anger than that ofthe bee. the waxen
walls of the latter being replaced in this
case hy the tissues Of a living animal.
The creature can afford to dispense with
the abdominal organs, since it has
henceiorth to act as an animated sweet
meat.
DR.. McCook's observations enabled
him to discover that the working ants,
returning from their outdoor foraging,
with their bodies distended with the
honey they have somewhere harvested,
enter the chambers of the nest and eject
this sweet fluid from their own mouths
into the mouths of the honey-bearers,
whose bodies become greatly distended
with the delicious flood. In other cases
he perceived hungry ants seeking for a
meal from the food thus generously
stored up. The honey-bearer seemed to
slightly contract the muscles of the alb
dominal skin, forcing from its mouth
minute globules of honey; these clung to
the hairs of the under lip, and were Gag
erly Tapped up by the hungry ants wait