The Lives of Ants Review

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(More customer reviews)Anyone who has existed for more than an eye blink on this planet has encountered ants. These creatures, amongst theearth's most ubiquitous, have a talent for squeezing themselves into environments that previously seemed hermetically sealed. And they don't just enter, they occupy, particularly where voluminous foodstuffs lie strewn about (e.g., most human habitats). Many that come face to mandible with these diminutive invaders know next to nothing about their ways, they just want them out. But the curious may want to know how ants completely conquered the undergrowth. In many parts of the world a marching ant army means it's time to leave town, humans included. Though most ants appear no larger than three periods pronged together, as a collective they represent one of the greatest powers in all of the insect world. If you see army ants heading your way, run. Scorpions, spiders, crickets, katydids and even small birds and rodents do. They too have seen and know better than to mess with the ants.

Those who have delved into books about ants, perhaps some meant for youngsters, may have come out wanting. Others may have opened garage-sized entomology tracts with leading sentences incomprehensible to those outside of academia. Up to this point, books for general readers thirsty for details seem rarely to appear. Enter "The Lives of Ants," a book that's not too long nor too short. A book that does flirt with academic language in places, but mostly includes just enough detail without spewing arcane jargon. True, some sections wax genetics and terms such as "polygynous," "haploid" and "eusociality" creep from the text and produce the "I need a dictionary" sensation. But usually such terms receive adequate setup and explanation for even general readers to keep up. Fear fire ants, not vocabulary.

Eight distinct parts chop the discussion up into digestible bits. What remains incomprehensible is the number of ants present on our planet. No one really knows how many, but the first chapter uses the phrase "ten million billions." No other animal known appears in such quantities. And ants shun individualism as they unite and conquer as a "super-organism" revolving around single ("monogynous") or multiple ("polygynous") queens. Though most ants don't live long, some queens can endure for over a decade. Many also mate only once and still produce thousands of offspring. The males don't fare so well (their sorry fates compare to bee drones; most mate and die). Workers of some species lay eggs in the event of queen death. Unsurprisingly, diversity rules the ant kingdom. Substantial evidence has also built up that queens and workers play a political game in deciding the nature of their progeny. Queens lay the eggs, but nursemaid workers decide which larvae receive proper nourishment. Do any beings escape politics? Apparently not. Other sections deal with ant communication (pheromones help find the shortest path to and from food), rampaging army ants (just get out of the way), artistic weaver ants (who use larvae as little glue guns), wood ants (who spurt formic acid as defense), leaf-cutter ants (they use the leaves to harvest fungus), fascinating honeypot ants, livestock (aphids), incredibly destructive fire ants (really get out of the way, they not only bite but sting and can endanger large animals including humans), cloning, and genetics. Later chapters contain more technical, but not inaccessible, material. Debates over genetic determinations of behavior arise in discussions of the Gp-9 gene. In reference to this, the authors state "what we have here therefore is the first genetic element ever to be identified as influencing social organization in any living creature." Some background in genetics helps those with little background. A final section highlights the use of ant behavior in robotics. French scientists apparently discovered that the behavior of one species, Messor, follows Turing's laws - the first such validation, according to the authors. Even entomology and IT mingle.

Anyone looking for a juicier all-pervading treatment of ants will find "the Lives of Ants" a satisfying tromp. Be warned, the book references many Latin species names and, as said before, may throw out some esoteric vocabulary. Lovers of ants will probably find themselves unable to put the book down. Others may struggle through some of the more difficult sections, but the effort will pay off in a deeper and more comprehensive understanding of our most ubiquitous planetary companions. You'll never want to step on another one again.

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