YouTube must have good algorithms when it comes to “suggesting” videos that you might want to watch: these appear on the right side of the page when you watch a video. And this four-minute clip, from BBC Earth, and narrated by David Attenborough, sucked me in instantly. Even though I was horrified, I couldn’t take my eyes off it
Well, it’s really not that bad, and it’s also biologically instructive. I have seen one of these columns in my life, and my instinct was to get the hell away from it!
Notice the strong selection imposed on potential prey to KEEP STILL if the army ants are there. So long as you don’t move, you’re safe. Those individuals who do move don’t leave their genes behind.
Here’s a related BBC video on “driver ants“, the African version of army ants:
Look around before you lie down!
Lie very very still!
Woah – this is what it suggested to me after the army ants (who I salute!) –
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_teA-EG7Ac0
One for atheists!
I think the closest thing we have in the U.S. would be fire ants. All across the south they are trouble. The mounds in the yard were your first alert you had them. You never want to step on them or walk through them — they really bite.
Fire ant bites have gotta be worse. They bite repeatedly, injecting venom, which hurts like hell.
In grade school we had a librarian that on Halloween would turn off lights, light candles, and read The Monkey’s Paw to every class. I distinctly remember hearing the story in grade 1. For non holiday terror, he would read us Leiningen Versus the Ants.
Every school needs a teacher like Mr. Fox.
Brutal little bastards, aren’t they? Red in antennae and jaw.
I have spent time in the middle of army ant swarms in Panama, watching the cool birds that accompany the ants and use them as prey flushers (antbirds, ground cuckoos, etc). If one sits very quietly (and still) on a small camping chair, the ants do not bug you. It is a pretty thrilling spectacle.
Whoa…that sounds intense. Like sitting above hot lava.
I have not seen the video yet but I am going to do it as soon as I have a break. To learn something about army ants I can recommend this book that also contains wonderful photos:
Daniel JC Kronauer. Army Ants. Harvard University Press 2020.