Amazing things, those little critters ants. They have many attributes. For example, your average ant can lift more than 20 times its body weight. If you could run as fast for your size as an ant can, you could keep pace with any contender for the Kentucky Derby.
Your typical ant has two stomachs. One stomach holds the food for itself and second stomach is for food to be shared with others. God forbid that gastric bypass is ever required.
Some worker ants are given the job of taking the rubbish from the nest and putting it outside in a special trash dump. Environmentally conscious they are.
An ant colony is virtually Amazonian in nature. The larger colonies consist mostly of sterile wingless females forming castes of "workers", "soldiers" and other specialized tasks. There are "male" drones who basically are buzzing around waiting to die.
Male and female ants are both born with large wings. When the ant matures, these wings are used so that it can fly into the air to mate. Once they are done doing the deed, something strange happens. The male ant's wings fall off. Then he dies.
Bummer if you're a dude ant. But that's what happens when you have unprotected sex.
Meanwhile, the female ant immediately searches for a place to start a new colony as a fertile "queen," ready to make new conquests and kill again. Her sole job now is to be everybody's mother and lay eggs which soon become larva then pupa then adult. She gets to live an estimated 10 years.
Then one day she croaks and one of her progeny takes her place. Kind of the way it's been operating for centuries in England, with the exception of there being no male heirs to the throne.
And ants are smart, too. At night, the worker ants move the eggs and larvae deep into the nest to protect them from the cold. During the daytime, the worker ants move the eggs and larvae of the colony to the top of the nest so that they can be warmer.
Scientists say an ant's brain may have the same processing power as a Macintosh II computer. But who really owns one of those ancient things any more?
King Solomon once wrote, “Go to the ant, consider its ways and be wise.” I think one of the things he might have meant is consider the source of the ant's strength. Each ant has a specific role or pursues a particular task. And helping others.
In the end, they are working to make their colony more productive and sustain it for future generations.
When you have an average life span of about 90 days you don’t want to waste much time. Your mother has high hopes and expectations of you. God save the Queen.
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