Reddit reviews The Superorganism: The Beauty, Elegance, and Strangeness of Insect Societies

This happens every year, often several times per year. The ants that fly are both males and virgin queens, and this is called a mating flight. Ants are really cool in that they are able to time the flight across different colonies and huge distances, so all the colonies send out their males and queens at the same time.

In about 24 hours all the males will have died, and the queens will land and lose their wings. They now have a few months to get the basics of a colony going before winter begins, and naturally only a small percentage will be successful.

Source: I've read this book.

EDIT: It's also called a Nuptial flight, and here is a Wikipedia article about it.

> The flight requires clear weather since rain is disruptive for flying insects. Different colonies of the same species often use environmental cues to synchronize the release of males and queens so that they can mate with individuals from other nests, thus avoiding inbreeding. The actual "take off" from the parent colony is also often synchronized so that predators cannot eat the ants one by one.

its not christians we bash ... its their ideas ... the fact that you think you diserve respect for your relgion is a joke as it is hate filled and does nothing but promote hate .... its funny i can not go to a church with out them saying life with out god is not worth living ( sooo rude to make jundgements on other peoples worth )

its not the people we bash on its their IDEAS and IGNORANCE .... its the fact the christian relgion is trying to drag us into the dark ages agian .. we have people who want to say that women do not have the right to save their own life ( abortion ) it is the fact that they are tying to force the teaching of superstition in schools ... ( ID )

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i also find it funny that christians are the ones behind the idea that gays are not people and do not deserve the rights other people have to live life the way they choose ... but its the bigoted Christians they say hate the SIN not the sinner but they do not understand that being gay for some people is not a choice but biologically driven if you do not think there is no room for people in our society because they don't make babies... ( IMHO that's fighting evolution and not seeing the worth they bring to our society not to mention its not very nice to treat fellow human beings like this ... but the Christians are not big into empathy for their fellow man i guess ... how big of them ... )

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sooo when you talking of bashing please look at what current Christians are doing to nonbelievers and unlucky believers that get caught up into your religion ...


so to recap ... its less offensive to say " Love The Religious but Hate the RELIGION " i know i heard something like this before but the thing i heard is that its ok to hate gays unless they change who they are ... does not sound very nice ... fuck your religion .... but not you ...


ps lets not forget ... where Christians come from as moral leaders when it comes to bashing non believers ... stick and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me unless its the word of your god and then i am sure you fell ok hurting people in the name of your god and if you don't your religion did and you share in the blood your religion has split ... ....

For those curious, this is a Pogonomyrmex Badius (Florida Harvester Ant, http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/urban/ants/harvester_ant.htm http://www.antweb.org/description.do?genus=pogonomyrmex&species=badius&rank=species&project=allantwebants) ant colony. The photograph is by Charles F. Badland. Walter Tschinkel made the cast and is standing next to it in the picture. You can find more pictures like these, and lots of awesome information about ants in the book The Superorganism by Bert Holldobler and Edward O. Wilson.
http://www.amazon.com/Superorganism-Beauty-Elegance-Strangeness-Societies/dp/0393067041/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1417722107&sr=1-1&keywords=the+superorganism

The Superorganism is a great book all about ants and their social heirarchy. The wording in the book tends towards the academic but its still very enjoyable.
Link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0393067041

William Morton Wheeler thought of ant colonies as 'superorganisms' and thought that a colony of ants is like an 'organism.' This concept is much debated, and Holldobler and Wilson provide a more modern treatment in their recent book:

http://www.amazon.com/Superorganism-Beauty-Elegance-Strangeness-Societies/dp/0393067041/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1427516536&sr=1-1&keywords=super+organism

I got a lot out of reading Superorganism. Could be used either as reference or as something to read through.

http://www.amazon.com/Superorganism-Beauty-Elegance-Strangeness-Societies/dp/0393067041/ref=sr_1_26?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1382143744&sr=1-26&keywords=ant+book

Yeah the superorganism idea is pretty cool, there is a must read book if you are interested in that kind of thing.

No, but it WAS by the same author! I found this book, which was the one! Thanks!