Evening star., 1934-05-30
Slave Ants
BY D. c. PEATTIE.

ON ALMOST any day of this season
you will see quantities Of black
ants, rather large of body, and very
long Of leg, running actively about on
sidewalks in the city. in suburban gar
dens and in the woods. These are the
creatures biologists call FOrmiCa fuSca,
or sometimes slave ant. However. they
are really seldom seen in a state of
slavery. so that the best way of know
ing them is by these presents: The
Satiny sheen on the abdomen, the dull
and dusty black of the rest of the
creature. as though he had fallen down
in the dust and scrambled away and
the long legs.
This ant is usually seen hunting
Singly, and in Spring, when the re-
serves of the nest are low. the ants
eagerly attack absolutely anything that
falls to the ground. as we'll as running
to the tops of the highest trees, and
looking in at every flower. l find
them Juggling off worms, beetles and
even q dead snake The worms are
often alive, and the beetles and bees
are alive in many cases also, although
naturally they are wounded or some
how disabled
Frequently many of the slave ants
attack beetle at once, and We get
the illusion of mutual help. Actually.
I'm sure. each finds the food or quarry
separately. 1t is true that by instinct
any one of them would simply take
the prey to the nest to be shared in
the common larder. but If you watch
closely you will observe that these
creatures get in each others way.
There seems to be none of those in
audible signals, that captaincy, that
travellers to Mogador and Malabar are
always telling us about in ants, but
which We never see.
Only recently l was watching the
nest of some slave ants. which was,
as usual guarded by several sentinels
who walked about. swapping their
laws even at the shadow of my hand.
as 1 passed it over their dwelling.
Then my attention was caught by
combat between small brown jump
ing spider and one of the ants, just
on the edge of the ant hill. I supposed,
of course, that the ant was bringing in
one more kicking victim. Not at all!
This very small spider was making OIL
with a very large ant. And this was
happening in full vieW-not inches
away-of the patrolling sentinelS.
l took my pencil and pried the
astoniShed spider loose from the ant.
Then I dropped the ant on his hill.
The sentinels rushed up to him, ex-
amined him, and saw that he was "all
right"
One second later that little spider
was right on top of her old prey. She
literally dragged him out of the fort
ress. where even very large animals
have been sawed up alive, and lugged
him off once more. 1 concluded that
the spider deserved her breakfast, and
the ant was hauled away with my con-
sent and that of the guards, his fel-
low ants.
What must we conclude from this?
Certainly not that this species of ant
exhibits any intelligence, or an infal-
libie instinct for acting together.
Either the ants are literally blind, in
spite of their supposedly wonderful
eyes, or they only respond in hostility
to certain sights and smells. The
jumping spider was not on their in
stincts list of enemies, so they let
the spider carry off an inmate of
their nest without any consciousness
that it mattered to the nest or to the
individual. I'm far from suggesting
that the same thing would have hap
pened on the nest of another species
of ant,