Jun 3, 2022
Everyone wants to be an ant.
Read more here: https://twitter.com/7StellarJays/status/1530965605318262784
Read More: https://twitter.com/Myrmecos/status/1223977145057366018
seen from France
seen from China
seen from Malaysia
seen from United States
seen from Israel
seen from United States
seen from Romania
seen from Türkiye
seen from South Korea
seen from United States
seen from Australia
seen from Italy
seen from United Kingdom
seen from Israel
seen from Türkiye
seen from China
seen from Malaysia
seen from Japan
seen from United States
seen from Indonesia
Everyone wants to be an ant.
Read more here: https://twitter.com/7StellarJays/status/1530965605318262784
Read More: https://twitter.com/Myrmecos/status/1223977145057366018
The fly that tricks ants and who never grows up.
Imagine you run a nursery. You & your sisters care for many helpless babies. One day you notice a baby is... different. It never grows up. It's not a baby ant! It's an adult phorid fly! A fly without legs, or wings! Can you spot the fake? Can you spot the fake? (Image source)
This ant is not carrying a larvae but one of the phorid flies. She found it and is taking it to the nursery where it "belongs" We don't know the whole life cycle of this sneaky parasitic insect yet. It was only discovered in 1995 and there is much more research to be done!
Vestigipoda sp. trick army ants into taking care of them.
I cannot stress how WIERD it is that an *adult* fly is totally immobile & looks like a larvae of another species. (army ants in this case)
Under a microscope you can see the fly-like features of Vestigipoda's face. Incredible becoming totally "helpless" is such an effective adaptation. I really want to know what the entire life cycle is like. How do they mate? What are they like when they are maggots? Are they disappointed to be a maggot and pupate only to be a larvae?
(Listen, creepy fly... at least you don't need to do anything to find food. The ants clean you and take care of everything. )
Imagine an ... Ant Girl Punk Band.
Lead Singer (camponotus thaddeus, True ant)
Bass Guitar (White Velvet Ant )
Drums (Polyrhachis armata, true ant)
Male and female Myrmarachne spiders may mimic different species of ant!
Male and female spiders can be vastly different sizes. So, for ant-mimic spiders how do they deal with this? In some cases, the male and female spider use *different* species of ants as their model.
(put together with images from: https://pbertner.wordpress.com/tips-for-ants/ )
... everyone wants to be an ant ...
What if all these bug and spiders* are ant mimics because they just want to know what it's like to have a huge family that love you unconditionally? 😢
Ant-mimic Fly - An ant-mimicking sepsis fly, also known as a lesser dung fly, sitting on the edge of a Japanese anemone leaf. https://flic.kr/p/2m82VhT
Ant-mimicking spider.