Arizona Oddities

Main Menu

  • Home
  • Your Guides
  • Departments
    • Art
    • Dose of History
    • Culture
    • Natural Surroundings
    • Odd Observations
    • Weather Talk
    • Food & Dining
    • Small Town Scene
    • Recreation
    • Only in Arizona
  • Get the Books
  • Contact Us

logo

Arizona Oddities

  • Home
  • Your Guides
  • Departments
    • Art
    • Dose of History
    • Culture
    • Natural Surroundings
    • Odd Observations
    • Weather Talk
    • Food & Dining
    • Small Town Scene
    • Recreation
    • Only in Arizona
  • Get the Books
  • Contact Us
Natural Surroundings
Home›Natural Surroundings›An Ant Orgy in My Pool?

An Ant Orgy in My Pool?

By Andrea Aker
July 9, 2012
3509
0

Excerpt from Valley 101: The Great Big Book of Life, a collection of Clay Thompson’s columns for The Arizona Republic. (Originally published July 28, 2001.)

AntsQ: Recently I noticed some black puffballs or seedpods floating in the swimming pool. I tossed one on to the edge of the pool and looked at it closely, and it started moving. It was a bunch of ants hanging on to each other. When they had dispersed, there was absolutely nothing left. What was going on?

A: I guess your pleasure in having an answer depends on how you feel about other species reproducing in your swimming pool. The ants were having a bit of the old slap and tickle, so to speak.

They probably were carpenter or harvester ants, although it is hard to tell without seeing them firsthand, even for such an expert as the estimable entomologist Carl Olson of the University of Arizona.

Olson is the co-author of Insects of the Southwest, which is one of my favorite books, especially if I can’t get to sleep.

I do not mean to be snarky here. It is a well-written and useful book. It is interesting enough to hold the layperson’s attention but not such a page-turner that it keeps you awake for more than a chapter or so. Plus the softcover edition won’t rap the bridge of your nose if the book pitches forward on your face after you fall asleep. I recommend it highly.

Anyway, I consulted with Olson on your question, and he said this is the time of year when a young ant’s fancy turns to procreation.

“We’re in the throes of the mating season. Sex is on the wing, if you will,” said he. “All sorts of ants are leaving the nest and flying away in clusters. What she saw was a big glob of ants, a mass of ant humanity, I suppose you could say.”

This is the deal: If you knew how to tell the boy ants from the girl ants and if you had pried that glob of ants apart one by one, you probably would have found at the center one female ant, no doubt somewhat bedraggled, surrounded by a bunch of sex-crazed male ants, all vying for her attention, assuming ants have attention. It was, in Olson’s words, “an ant orgy.”

 

(Visited 1,072 times, 1 visits today)

Related Posts:

  1. How Much Water Does My Swimming Pool Lose Through Evaporation?
  2. Odd Ways to Hydrate Your Christmas Tree
  3. World’s First Wave Pool Returns to its Roots
  4. What Causes “Pool of Water” Reflections on the Road?
  5. 4 (Somewhat) Hidden Gems in the Scottsdale Area
Tagsinsects

Leave a reply Cancel reply

Arizona Oddities Archive

Most Popular Posts

  • How to Keep Scorpions Away from Your Home
  • How to Keep Javelinas Away from Your Yard
  • What’s With All the Backyard Concrete-Block Fences…
  • Did You Know it’s Against the Law to Grow…
  • Four Deserts, One State

This Week Past Years

2018

  • The Anthem Hitchhiker Waits for a Ride to Nowhere

2017

  • Biosphere 2 Brings a Rainforest to the Arizona Desert

2016

  • Yuma's Bridge to Nowhere

2013

  • Winslow Chamber of Commerce Housed in Old Arizona Trading Post
  • Sculpture Garden at Yavapai College Features a Fancy, 5-Foot Frog

2012

  • What is Orange Stringy Substance Covering Desert Plants?
  • Arizona History Trivia 4: Can You Pass?

2011

  • What Causes "Pool of Water" Reflections on the Road?

2010

  • The Case of The Vanishing Train Robbers
  • Recent

  • Popular

  • Comments

  • Find a Famous Writer and Explorer's Mountain Retreat in Greer

    Find a Famous Writer and Explorer’s Historic Mountain Retreat in Greer

    By Taylor Haynes
    July 31, 2020
  • thousands of Mexican free tail bats make Phoenix tunnel their summer home

    Thousands of Mexican Free-Tail Bats Make Phoenix Tunnel Their Summer Home

    By Taylor Haynes
    July 17, 2020
  • How to Keep Scorpions Away from Your Home

    By Andrea Aker
    January 3, 2011
  • Javelina

    How to Keep Javelinas Away from Your Yard

    By Andrea Aker
    November 23, 2011
  • Phil Motta
    on
    August 27, 2021

    Why Does Downtown Phoenix Seem to Have Two Downtowns?

    I know this post ...
  • Carol
    on
    October 17, 2020

    The Tucson Artifacts are the Southwest’s Greatest Hoax

    lol ... these "clues" ...

Follow us

© Copyright 2009 – 2023 Aker Ink, LLC :: Arizona Oddities is published by Aker Ink.