Fire Ants Build Raft Made Of Fallen Comrades To Survive Flood
It’s a tale old as time: the elite climb atop the backs of the workers, trampling those in their way to survive.
A fire ant colony that was swept along in the floods in South Carolina used the bodies of underlings to form a giant raft and float along the water to a new land.
According to local Fox Carolina News, flotillas of ants have been spotted in nearby areas in the past few days.
In 2011, National Geographic reported that fire ant floats weren’t an uncommon sight, relatively. Said Georgia Institute of Technology graduate student David J. Mlot:
“They’ll gather up all the eggs in the colony and will make their way up through the underground network of tunnels, and when the flood waters rise above the ground, they’ll link up together in these massive rafts.”
Buoyed by the bodies of the fallen, the tiny insects will sail to a new land and settle a new colony, renegade ants in a brave new world.
