Title: Mandible show off Location: North of Port Wakefield, SA Country: Australia Subject Notes: The ants of Australia are a wonder to behold. Many of them are from genera considered ancestral links to wasps and can still see and sting. When encountered, they look up, and keeping their eyes on us, slowly back away. This ant was one of a colony that was eerily human in their activities. Each individual ant seemed to have a particular job - such as the one moving bits of rock to the trash pile, or the two widening their hole to bring the huge berry down, or four sucking juice from the berry to make it smaller, or the seven building a shelter of mud and small sticks by the second opening. Other ants acted as part-time supervisors, checking up on any other ants in an aggressive stance. While this sounds organized, it wasn't. For example, the rock carrying ant ran out of rocks needing to be removed. So, it carried the same rock back and forth to and from the trash pit for the remainder of the evening. Perhaps it didn't want to get in trouble, or seem to not be busy. The ants that were working on moving the berry down the hole only numbered about four at any given moment, though there were about twenty that were standing around or biting at the legs of others. They often would wander away, but whenever it seemed the berry might just fit, they would run over to make sure not to miss the action. And in the end, when the berry did disappear down the hole, they all marched triumphantly down the hole, including the rock carrier still carrying the rock! The ant in the picture was the first ant to appear the following morning, and as the air was quite chilly, it was moving slowly enough to capture on my camera. More pictures of these ants A picture of the red berries that made up their food source Photography notes: The lighting this Camera brand OLYMPUS OPTICAL CO.,LTD Camera model E-10 Exposure time 1/100 sec F-stop 2.8 ISO 80 Metering mode Spot Focal Length 34.0 mm early in the morning only allowed a very small depth of field for the shutter speed that was needed to capture the ant in focus with my macro lens. The cold morning temperature made the ant slow and easier to photograph, though this also meant I had to hold my breath to not fog the lens. Using the sand for additional stability, I laid down at ant level to give a feeling of being in the ant's world instead of viewing it from above. Only a small portion of the photograph was in focus, and to bring more attention to this section of the original photo, I cropped it to this area, making sure the ant itself was in the upper half; giving it a more elevated position. The panoramic shape of the photo also increases the sense of the ant's size. Trip: Australia

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