NEBRASKAland Magazine is dedicated to outstanding photography and informative writing with an engaging mix of articles and photos highlighting Nebraska’s outdoor activities, parklands, wildlife, history and people.
Issue link: http://mag.outdoornebraska.gov/i/902203
52 NEBRASKAland • NOVEMBER 2017 Flying Ants By Evan Barrientos O n a warm November afternoon I was walking through a prairie near Wood River when I realized I was not alone. Slowly, it dawned on me that I was standing below thousands, maybe millions, of flying insects. As I gazed around I saw dozens of swarms the size of cars, incessantly whirring and shifting. Slightly hypnotized, I walked underneath one of the swarms and saw many of the insects landing on the grasses below. Up close, I could see they had slender waists, suggesting they might be ants or wasps. Several of the insects were caught in strands of spider silk I had never seen before but suddenly were everywhere. While I was looking at one snared insect, I noticed something black and fuzzy scuttling toward it. After a moment of hiding, a jumping spider darted over to the insect and carried it away. This made me wonder: were the silk strands there by coincidence, or did the spiders realize there was a bonanza of food overhead and hastily cast lines like fishermen at a salmon run? This experience left me with many questions. First and foremost: what the heck had I seen? To find out, I sent photos to James Trager, an ant expert who works for the Missouri Botanical Garden. He instantly identified the insects to be a species of ant called Myrmica americana. According to Trager, male Myrmica ants swarm together in order to attract females to mate. Having been drawn below the swarm myself, I can see why this works! During the swarm, males descend to the curious females watching below and mate with them, if they can avoid the predators. Males are so zealous that dozens will compete over a single female, forming what some call a "mating ball." The females are no less dedicated. After mating, she pulls out her own wings in order to convert her wing muscle into food to feed her offspring via glandular secretions. Then, by herself, she crawls away to start her own colony. Interestingly, Trager explained that the ant in my photo is actually an unnamed species. There are currently three different ant species all being called Myrmica americana because two of them haven't been officially named yet. The unnamed species I encountered is actually quite common, which just shows how much we still have to learn about the amazing insects in our own backyards. ■ Evan Barrientos is the monitoring and outreach assistant for the The Nature Conservancy in southwestern Oregon. He has a passion for communicating ecological restoration and conservation through photography, videography and blogging. A Wood River prairie introduction. Ants swarm above a tallgrass prairie in Nebraska. Caught in a strand of silk, this flying ant awaits a jumping spider's grasp. PHOTOS BY EVAN BARRIENTOS