Proverbs 30:24, 25 There are four things which are little upon the earth, but they are exceeding wise: The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer…
I have been thinking about the critters and creatures the Father has made and how, if we pay attention, they can teach us much. Think of the ant….so tiny, yet so amazing! Here are some incredible facts about ants.
There are male and female ants. Only the males and queens have wings. When it is time for the young queen to establish another colony, she will fly off with several males. After mating, the males will find a place to die and the queen searches for an area to start her new nest.
Once the queen has her nesting spot, she will chew off her wings and eat them to nourish the eggs in her abdomen. She then lays her eggs, which go through three stages: egg, larva, and pupa. The queen creates her own colony since there are males, female workers and queen ants among her young. Once the worker ants, all females, emerge from the pupa, they begin working.
The worker ants are in charge of babysitting, creating separate rooms in the ant nest, and foraging for food. Each of the worker ants have a specific job within the colony. The babysitters watch over the eggs, larva, and pupa by keeping them clean and nourished.
Once the egg changes stages of growth, they are moved to separate rooms. These rooms are created by another group of worker ants. This group of ants carries bits of soil out of the main entrance, which is how the ant hill is formed. Imagine hundreds of tiny ants moving around under that ant hill! With all that activity, they are bound to get hungry, which brings me to the next group of worker ants…the food foragers.
The ants responsible for getting and storing food have several choices on the menu. One food source the ants use is aphids. Aphids suck the sap from plants, then the ants stroke the aphids to retrieve the sweet sap. The ants shepherd “herds” of aphids by moving them to the plants with the particular sap they want. They take great care of these little “herds.” Another food source is nuts and seeds. The nuts and seeds are harvested and brought back to the nest to be stored. If the food store gets wet, the ants carry it outside to dry in the sun. It is then returned to a dry storeroom. Finally, another source is the public stomach, or crop as it’s called. There are special worker ants that are called honey pots. These ants fill up the crop, then hang from a special place in the nest. They give new meaning to the term “hanging around.” All the hungry ants must do to eat is stroke these special honey pots which throw up a ball of sap. The honey pots actually have two stomachs…..the crop for the general public, and a personal stomach for their own nourishment. Ants are incredibly complex insects. They work as a huge team to provide food and shelter for the colony. There are many types of shelters.
In addition to homes in the ground, ants create homes in some other unique spots. Some ants live inside hollow plant stems. They get into the stem by holes they have bored out. Soldier ants, which are large worker ants, put their heads in these holes to keep intruders out. Members of the colony know the “password” or the stroke to gain entrance. They just stroke the soldier ant on the head, and she lets them in. Ants also makes homes in leaves by using the larvae. They fold the chosen leaf, and using the sticky substance that wraps around their young, they seal the edges of the leaf. Similar to “Elmer’s” glue! Some kinds of ants create mud balls to live in.
There are about 10,000 species of ants in the world. They range in size from tiny to two and a half inches. Ants are great for eating pests that kill forests. They are also a wonderful example of how to live a life full of giving and sharing…..working together for the good of the entire community.
We could take some valuable lessons from these marvelous critters on unity and teamwork.
Proverbs 6:6 Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise:
The Father has created some wonderful examples for us if we just take the time to observe what He has made. Amen!
Source: The Holy Bible, KJV, Nelson Regency 1990, Thomas Nelson, Inc.; If You Were an Ant, Barbara Brenner, 1973, Harper and Row New York; Ants and Termites, Gwynne Vevers, 1966, McGraw Hill Book Co., New York and San Francisco; Ants, Rebecca Stefoff, 1998, Marshall Cavendish, New York; Ants, Jenny Vaughan, 1997, Gareth Stevens, Milwaukee; A Closer Look at Ants, Valerie Pitt and David Cook, 1975, Franklin Watts, Inc., New York
