fab fax abt antz

this unfortunately ultimately rather silly article abt ants and human civilisation considered as a super-organism contains two things i am delighted to discover

i: one reason ants don't get lst is they COUNT THEIR STRIDES (which they tested by putting ants on little stilts and they DID et lost, in exact proportion to the extra length of the stilt!)
ii: depending on the species, "between 1 and 10 percent of the entire worker population of a colony dies each day, and in some species nearly half of the ants that forage outside the nest die daily" !!!

(actually i am a bit sad to discover ii but blimey)