tags: ants, hymenoptera, excavating ant city, nature, science, streaming video
This fascinating video details how a scientist learns what an ant colony looks like in the wild -- it's astonishing how big these things can get [3:16]
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GrrlScientist is an evolutionary biologist, ornithologist, aviculturist, birder and freelance science and nature writer. A native of the Pacific Northwest, she relocated from Seattle to NYC with her parrots after earning a BS in Microbiology (emphasis in Virology) and PhD in Zoology (Ornithology) from the University of Washington. In NYC, she was the Chapman Postdoctoral Fellow at the American Museum of Natural History for two years, pursuing part of her "dream" research project by reconstructing a molecular phylogeny of the parrots of the South Pacific islands. GrrlScientist and her five parrots are currently relocating to Germany, where she will continue writing her blog while also writing a book and learning German. (Meanwhile, her parrots will continue to nibble on her extensive personal library.) If you appreciate GrrlScientist's writing, you can help pay her living expenses by hiring her to "blog" your conference, speak at your club or write articles for your publication (or by clicking on the Paypal button below). If you read an essay on this blog that you especially enjoyed, please nominate it for inclusion in OpenLab2009.
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Excavating the Kingdom of the Ants
Topic Categories: Insects • Streaming videos
Posted on: January 26, 2009 8:59 AM, by "GrrlScientist"
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Comments
fascinating stuff, but I can't help feeling sorry for the ants :-(
Posted by: Tony Wildish | January 26, 2009 9:59 AM
i don't know this for a fact, but according to the notes accompanying this video, the ant nest was abandoned.
Posted by: "GrrlScientist" | January 26, 2009 1:18 PM
Amazing. I was also wondering about the ants--thanks for the info.
Posted by: Lilian Nattel | January 26, 2009 4:51 PM
"... the anonymous graduate students labor intensely for
the good of the super organism. The students move tons of earth, shovel-full by patient shovel-full. At the end, scarcely conceivable, lies the intangible reward. This complex behavior may seem strange to us, but in the world of the graduate student, no task is too Herculean..."
Posted by: Dr. Pablito | January 26, 2009 6:10 PM
A nice project. But as an entomologist, I want to know what species of ant was investigated. Genus and species would be good. Also I assume this happened in Africa somewhere - Where?
Posted by: Mike Grimm | January 26, 2009 10:07 PM
I believe it was Prof. Walter Tschinkel of Florida State U. who developed the techniques for making plaster and metal casts of ant nests. There are some great photos here.
Posted by: Julie Stahlhut | January 27, 2009 12:59 PM
Fascinating. However, to destroy a living colony in the name of science seems harsh and unnecessary, especially with the tools available to us today - such as infrared and sonic mapping. Surely they could have achieved the same thing without killing millions of innocent creatures! How old was that colony? How long will it take the ants that escaped to rebuild? So sad.
Posted by: Susan Trott | July 17, 2009 12:57 PM