The Pulitzer Prize-winning authors of "The Ants" render the extraordinary lives of the social insects--ants, bees, wasps, and termites--in this visually spectacular volume. 110 color and 100 black-and-white illustrations.
From the Arctic to South Africa - one finds them everywhere: Ants. Making up nearly 15% of the entire terrestrial animal biomass, ants are impressive not only in quantitative terms, they also fascinate by their highly organized and complex social system. Their caste system, the division of labor, the origin of altruistic behavior and the complex forms of chemical communication makes them the most interesting group of social organisms and the main subject for sociobiologists. Not least is their ecological importance: Ants are the premier soil turners, channelers of energy and dominatrices of the insect fauna. TOC:The importance of ants.- Classification and origins.- The colony life cycle.- Altruism and the origin of the worker caste.- Colony odor and kin recognition.- Queen numbers and domination.- Communication.- Caste and division of labor.- Social homeostasis and flexibility.- Foraging and territorial strategies.- The organization of species communities.- Symbioses among ant species.- Symbioses with other animals.- Interaction with plants.- The specialized predators.- The army ants.- The fungus growers.- The harvesters.- The weaver ants.- Collecting and culturing ants.- Glossary.- Bibliography.- Index.
Pulitzer Prize-winner Bert Hölldobler and behavioral ecologist Christina Kwapich reveal a universe of behavioral mechanisms whereby invaders known as myrmecophiles break into ant colonies. By decoding ants' sophisticated communication systems, these invaders disguise themselves as friendly, suppress ant aggression, and feast on colony resources.
Richly illustrated and delightfully written, Journey to the Ants combines autobiography and scientific lore to convey the excitement and pleasure the study of ants can offer. Bert Hölldobler and E. O. Wilson interweave their personal adventures with the social lives of ants, building, from the first minute observations of childhood, a remarkable account of these abundant insects’ evolutionary achievement.
From the Pulitzer Prize-winning authors of The Ants comes this dynamic and visually spectacular portrait of Earth's ultimate superorganism. The Leafcutter Ants is the most detailed and authoritative description of any ant species ever produced. With a text suitable for both a lay and a scientific audience, the book provides an unforgettable tour of Earth's most evolved animal societies. Each colony of leafcutters contains as many as five million workers, all the daughters of a single queen that can live over a decade. A gigantic nest can stretch thirty feet across, rise five feet or more above the ground, and consist of hundreds of chambers that reach twenty-five feet below the ground surface. Indeed, the leafcutters have parlayed their instinctive civilization into a virtual domination of forest, grassland, and cropland—from Louisiana to Patagonia. Inspired by a section of the authors' acclaimed The Superorganism, this brilliantly illustrated work provides the ultimate explanation of what a social order with a half-billion years of animal evolution has achieved.
Plant-animal interactions have become a focus of ecological research, with the processes of herbivory being of special interest. This volume examines the interactions of leaf-cutting ants with the rainforest vegetation on Barro Colorado Islands in Central America. It is the synthesis of field research on multiple scales extending over a period of several years. This work can serve as a model study summarizing and extending knowledge about herbivorous insect-plant relationships, and the resulting consequences on structural and functional features of tropical ecosystems. The text is an invaluable reference for researchers and land managers working in the fields of plant-animal interactions, herbivory, community ecology and biodiversity.
From the Arctic to South Africa - one finds them everywhere: Ants. Making up nearly 15% of the entire terrestrial animal biomass, ants are impressive not only in quantitative terms, they also fascinate by their highly organized and complex social system. Their caste system, the division of labor, the origin of altruistic behavior and the complex forms of chemical communication makes them the most interesting group of social organisms and the main subject for sociobiologists. Not least is their ecological importance: Ants are the premier soil turners, channelers of energy and dominatrices of the insect fauna. TOC:The importance of ants.- Classification and origins.- The colony life cycle.- Altruism and the origin of the worker caste.- Colony odor and kin recognition.- Queen numbers and domination.- Communication.- Caste and division of labor.- Social homeostasis and flexibility.- Foraging and territorial strategies.- The organization of species communities.- Symbioses among ant species.- Symbioses with other animals.- Interaction with plants.- The specialized predators.- The army ants.- The fungus growers.- The harvesters.- The weaver ants.- Collecting and culturing ants.- Glossary.- Bibliography.- Index.
The Pulitzer Prize-winning authors of "The Ants" render the extraordinary lives of the social insects--ants, bees, wasps, and termites--in this visually spectacular volume. 110 color and 100 black-and-white illustrations.
Richly illustrated and delightfully written, Journey to the Ants combines autobiography and scientific lore to convey the excitement and pleasure the study of ants can offer. Bert Hölldobler and E. O. Wilson interweave their personal adventures with the social lives of ants, building, from the first minute observations of childhood, a remarkable account of these abundant insects’ evolutionary achievement.
A fascinating examination of socially parasitic invaders, from butterflies to bacteria, that survive and thrive by exploiting the communication systems of ant colonies. Down below, on sidewalks, in fallen leaves, and across the forest floor, a covert invasion is taking place. Ant colonies, revered and studied for their complex collective behaviors, are being infiltrated by tiny organisms called myrmecophiles. Using incredibly sophisticated tactics, various species of butterflies, beetles, crickets, spiders, fungi, and bacteria insert themselves into ant colonies and decode the colonies’ communication system. Once able to “speak the language,” these outsiders can masquerade as ants. Suddenly colony members can no longer distinguish friend from foe. Pulitzer Prize–winning author and biologist Bert Hölldobler and behavioral ecologist Christina L. Kwapich explore this remarkable phenomenon, showing how myrmecophiles manage their feat of code-breaking and go on to exploit colony resources. Some myrmecophiles slip themselves into their hosts’ food sharing system, stealing liquid nutrition normally exchanged between ant nestmates. Other intruders use specialized organs and glandular secretions to entice ants or calm their aggression. Guiding readers through key experiments and observations, Hölldobler and Kwapich reveal a universe of behavioral mechanisms by which myrmecophiles turn ants into unwilling servants. As The Guests of Ants makes clear, symbiosis in ant societies can sometimes be mutualistic, but, in most cases, these foreign intruders exhibit amazingly diverse modes of parasitism. Like other unwelcome guests, many of these myrmecophiles both disrupt and depend on their host, making for an uneasy coexistence that nonetheless plays an important role in the balance of nature.
From the Pulitzer Prize-winning authors of The Ants comes this dynamic and visually spectacular portrait of Earth's ultimate superorganism. The Leafcutter Ants is the most detailed and authoritative description of any ant species ever produced. With a text suitable for both a lay and a scientific audience, the book provides an unforgettable tour of Earth's most evolved animal societies. Each colony of leafcutters contains as many as five million workers, all the daughters of a single queen that can live over a decade. A gigantic nest can stretch thirty feet across, rise five feet or more above the ground, and consist of hundreds of chambers that reach twenty-five feet below the ground surface. Indeed, the leafcutters have parlayed their instinctive civilization into a virtual domination of forest, grassland, and cropland—from Louisiana to Patagonia. Inspired by a section of the authors' acclaimed The Superorganism, this brilliantly illustrated work provides the ultimate explanation of what a social order with a half-billion years of animal evolution has achieved.
Plant-animal interactions have become a focus of ecological research, with the processes of herbivory being of special interest. This volume examines the interactions of leaf-cutting ants with the rainforest vegetation on Barro Colorado Islands in Central America. It is the synthesis of field research on multiple scales extending over a period of several years. This work can serve as a model study summarizing and extending knowledge about herbivorous insect-plant relationships, and the resulting consequences on structural and functional features of tropical ecosystems. The text is an invaluable reference for researchers and land managers working in the fields of plant-animal interactions, herbivory, community ecology and biodiversity.
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