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We moved into a house in the fall that had an active carpenter ant infestation. We were also getting occasional surges of sugar ants through the winter. As bot
by Cd00d 6y ago
We moved into a house in the fall that had an active carpenter ant infestation. We were also getting occasional surges of sugar ants through the winter.
As both colonies were kicking back up in the spring, my oldest started asking a lot of questions about ants.
I shared one story that I was told decades ago and have never had the chance to confirm. Maybe someone here will know of the right resource.
Before ants, the forests were literally starving under the weight of fallen trees. When trees died, there wasn't enough natural rot to remove the wood and leave room for new undergrowth. Then ants evolved, and ant saliva is full of formic acid [0], and that breaks down wood. Suddenly, old dead wood wasn't a hurdle for regrowth, and the forests and nature prospered with new and evolving flora.
[0] I might have the type of acid wrong this many years later.
I've always liked this story, but if you told me it was bunk I wouldn't be shocked. I'd like some confirmation either way!
- timeslip1523 6y agoThe acid's definitely right- 'formic' comes from fourmis, the french word for ant!
- inimino 6y agoEven older -- both come from Latin formica, which also just means "ant." On the other hand, the plastic called formica, familiar as a countertop surface, has nothing to do with ants but comes from "for mica", for which it was originally developed as a subtitute.
- gadders 6y agoThere is also the word "formication": Formication is the sensation that resembles that of small insects crawling on (or under) the skin when there is nothing there.
- PEJOE 6y agoI believe you are thinking about lignin digestion - an action of certain fungi, but its contribution to the end of the Carboniferous is debated. https://arstechnica.com/science/2016/01/why-was-most-of-the-earths-coal-made-all-at-once/ https://arstechnica.com/science/2016/01/why-was-most-of-the-... As interesting as it would be, ants don’t seem to play a big role here.
- kleer001 6y agoAh, I've not heard of ants as a cause for the fall of the carboniferous era. Sounds plausible tho. I thought it was mushrooms and their eventual discovery of how to dissolve lignin. https://www.astrobio.net/also-in-news/fungi-marked-the-end-of-the-coal-age/ https://www.astrobio.net/also-in-news/fungi-marked-the-end-o...
- btilly 6y agoThe earliest known ants are around 100 million years ago. The carboniferous era ended around 300 million years ago. Ant as an explanation doesn't seem plausible to me.
- layoutIfNeeded 6y agoThe story you were told is false. Ants don't eat wood. Most ants are predators or scavengers, and some have evolved symbiotic relationship with certain fungi. Dead wood is degraded mostly by fungi, because other organisms lack the enzymes required to digest the polymers that make wood hard, called lignin.