The ants arrived in the mail yesterday. Mr. Dump received them, and the first thing he saw when he opened the package was the following warning:
CAUTION! DO NOT TOUCH THESE ANTS
The harvester ant can inflict a painful sting that normally causes local swelling and itching. If you are stung apply ice to the area until the pain subsides. If symptoms persist see your physician. Persons who are allergic to stinging insects should be especially careful as they may need emergency medical attention in the event of an allergic reaction.
Oh my God. Killer ants are in my house. Did you ever see the movie Phase IV? That’s what I’m picturing. Mr. Dump IS allergic to bee stings, so I’m pretty sure he was ever so happy to have received this package today. My fear is that knowing how clumsy Junior is, this container is going to hit the floor, smash open, and the ants will fly onto our faces. Or something like that. I can tell you, if something did happen (the lid seems REALLY secure) I wouldn’t be trying to wrangle them back into the container. Can you say “Look out! It’s a shoe!” little ant people?
When I have more time, I’ll have to see if I can get a close up of one of them for you. They look pretty fierce. They were completely creeping me out last night because They hadn’t started tunneling yet, so they were freaking out trying to climb the sides and there’s something unsettling with a bunch of ants walking around on top of something as opposed to ants making tunnels and stuff. That is definitely less creepy to me.
So in a battle between your ants and our (still not sprinkled into water) Sea Monkeys, who would win? Only one will survive!
I’d put money on the ants because, as I once learned in researching a column, it’s very hard to drown ants. Then again, as we all learned from comic books, Sea Monkeys can build castles, and if they can do that, they can probably rig up some pots of burning pitch, no?
These suckers have honkin’ large pinchers, the better to crush your puny Sea Monkeys with.
Looks alot like a goverment operation, see the one ant in the corner doing all the work? The others are trying to look busy so they can collect a paycheck.
I grew up with red ants in the garden, nasty stings but they didn’t last for too long (the stings I mean)
Do you have to declare them if there is a cencus?
Karen, your comment made me laugh. It was odd, there were three digging and the rest were, well, hanging out. Then, out of nowhere they all hit the goo and made a huge number of tunnels. I have to take another picture today, because it’s so much more developed than it was yesterday!
Anji, I’d put them on the census but I don’t know how old they are.