The Language of Ants

Summers a decade ago moved as slow as a tortoise in a mid-day sun. I remember myself, swinging from the guava tree in my backyard. I spent most of my time under that tree. Sometimes swinging, sometimes looking at the ants that rented their house under the guava tree. It was so fascinating to see them, that I would feed them just to have them at my sight. I used to reach out for the broadest leaf of the tree, and lay out a banquet of sugary delights for those tiny magnificent creatures.

I had a belief that ants communicate using their own language but due to their size we couldn't hear them( I grew up watching disney movies like, A BUG'S LIFE). It was not until recently, that I discovered how ants communicate. I came across this mind bogling book written by Ed Yong titled, "An Immense World". This book breaks down the chunks of information of how the animals sense the world around them, which has been termed as UMWELT. This book is a delight for my inner child. 

       An image my father had captured a               decade ago under the Guava tree.

Ed Yong beautifully breaks down on how the ants communicate using pheromones. Yes, you read that right pheromones are the language of ants. We have had a wrong notion, that pheromones are meant to attract the opposite sex in animal kingdom, but it goes beyond that. There are many ways, these tiny creatures use them to communicate. Based on the latest research, the scientists have classified 3 types of pheromones depending on their weight i.e., light weight pheromones, medium weight pheromones as well as heavy weight pheromones.

The ants release light weight pheromones when they sense danger from the predator. These chemicals, due to lighter weight rapidly spread throughout the colony, alarming the whole colony about the predator or the danger. The medium weight chemicals are used to mark trails. This is the exact chemical, that helps ants stay in line and follow preceding friend. They are used to hunt treasures(food) and to lead other friends to the treasury they have found. Finally, comes the heavy weight pheromones. These chemicals are species specific and individual specific (like sweat in humans). They don't spread in the air, but are used to identify their colonymates, workers and queens as well as their nemesis from other colonies. Isn't it phenomenal?

 This, I believe is 1% of what we know about the communication of ants. The only way to understand the senses of other organisms is to subject them to various stimuli. In the event that they respond to this stimuli, we can conclude that, organism is sensitive to specific stimuli therefore, it has a specific sense towards a chemical, light, food etc. 

E.O. Willson is a biologist who has done vast research on pheromone of ants. Willson daubed oleic acid on the body of the living ants. When these ants were introduced back to the colony, their friends considered them "dead". They were given the last rites before dumping them in garbage. It didn't matter if the ants were visibly alive, all that mattered was that, they smelt dead. 

The sense of smell in ants is the strongest umwelt they have eloved, and with this sense they are capable of communicating. An ant without olfactory senses is an ant that doesn't belong to the colony, and an ant without a colony is barely an ant at all. This makes me wonder if there are pheromones for every emotion - happiness, greif, love, fear, anger etc. It is so satisfying to have resolved the mysteries that have hung onto me from my childhood. Now I long to speak in their language and perhaps we are just few leaps away from communicating with them.