Now growing up here in San Diego, pretty much my whole life, I've encountered this wry little devil on a yearly basis (in large numbers) for the passed 35 (ouch, better make that 36) years. Never gave them much thought. It's just an ant. Spray the line, take out the trash, just deal with it. But today, whilst perusing the realm of the intraweb I came upon a number of very 'matter of fact' articles about the evils of this very particular ant.
The Argentine Ant
First off, I was amazed that this ant isn't the same as everyone else's ant. No this one is special. This ant, wich apparently has only Invaded California, some locations in the southern US states, and the Medeteranian coast is a particularly nasty beast.
Now we all have heard of 'army ants'. Well apparently, those guys aint got nothing on this one. Army ants are more of a nomadic breed. They rove around catching what they can and forming temporary bivoacs. However, this is where the real differance is. If two army colonies meet, even of the same species, combat ensues over the imediate territory. Thus ensuring a limited population of them in any given area, as there is no other creature that could combat or contend with a rampaging army of 'army ants' (heck they kill livestock in brazil!). Everything else just tries it's damndest to just get out of the way!
But my ant, the special ant, has a very different idea of... well, how else can you put it, Nationalism. See this little peon of an ant, the Argentinian ant, here in the 'colonies' it's created, has decided to band together as one. One nation to rule the world, as perhaps you could put it. Not only do these little bastards drive away other ants of different species, the different nests will band together in doing so. One ant from colony A can mingle with colony B, and visa-versa. These guys have all teamed up together and because of that, they have become all dominate in the areas that they could gain a foothold.
Now I must mention that in Argentina, the little suckers dont do this. They fight amongst themselves and are actually not very ubiquitous in thier own native country. But here man.... you can't swing a dead cat without steppin on 3 of them (and having 500 more fly off the aformentioned dead cat).
"Who cares?" you ask? Well for 1, the Horned Lizzard does. This poor bastard eats ants. But these interlopers just dont fit the bill. Our native Harvester ants are tasty and filling. These little guys, aint enough to live on. So the population has dropped 50% from when my parents where growing up. The 'horney toad' as they called em, used to be a familiar sight. Ask some kid now, they got no clue wtf you talkin'bout.
One more thing that amazed me about these guys. Argentina is by far, a much soggier place than this scrubland called San Diego. As such, our little nationalistic invader cannot live more than a few hundred feet from a supply of water (read as, your lawn or toilet tank). So on our outskirt towns, you can walk away from your house, and within 100 yards you will see them neet looking big bright red harvesters millin about as if nothing was going on. The black tide is comin, and them red suns'obitches aint got no clue.
That brought up another little insight. That the fact that we as humans, belive we can destroy an eco-system by buidling and paving is a bit ego-centric. We can destroy an exsisting one, but a new one will soon follow in it's footsteps.
Just remeber, next time you see something as mundane as an ant, there is a rather deep and interesting story behind it. I feel sorry for them texans who have the Red Imported Fire Ant to deal with, cause them bastards sting!~
