Status [ants, Arizona]
Jul. 5th, 2021 08:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rebeccmeisterSaturday morning I checked the Pima County rain gauges: enough rain to trigger leafcutter ant mating swarms. I went down to the lake for rowing practice, but screwed up the time and was 30 minutes late, so no rowing after all. Instead I toodled around the lake for a bit and through chance bumped into an old randonneur who provided support on the brevet where our friend RG flatted 7 times on his Brompton before throwing in the towel.
Then, campus. I finished prepping the leafcutter nest dishes that I'd brought with me to Arizona and attended to the seed-harvester ant queens. Then back to the house by way of the auto repair shop, where I picked up the Honda with its new radiator. When I got to the house, I checked the oil and noted the oil level was still low, so I walked back over to the closest gas station and picked up a couple more quarts of oil. Put those in, packed a couple things up, then told my smart-o-phone to point me to Tucson whilst avoiding the highways, and got on the road.
I made it about 5 miles when the engine coughed hard and blew a bunch of smoke. I somehow got myself into a left-turn lane at Broadway and McClintock, waved people around me, and sat through a light cycle with the engine off. When the arrow turned green again, I managed to limp the car into a shaded parking spot at a Burger King and then called my uncle.
While I waited for the tow truck, I booked a rental car from the airport rental place (nothing else open due to the holiday weekend) and put my bike back together (borrowing a bike from a friend). Instead of just taking the light rail over, I decided to bike there, not realizing that the airport rental car place is a whole separate facility several miles further down the road from the airport.
Regardless - made it there, stuffed the bike into the rental car, and got on the road to Tucson. I made it there by 6:30, which was enough time to drive the usual roads and check to see whether there was evidence of queens having already flown. Seeing none, I drove back to my aunt's house, where she spoiled me with a lavish and delicious dinner at a Mexican restaurant. I can't even begin to describe how wonderful it was to get to catch up with her and my cousin D. They have been so good to me over the years, and it was also a real treat for them to get to catch up because they haven't been able to go much of anywhere. My cousin D is on immune-suppressing drugs and still has to be extremely careful about It.
If the queens had already flown, I would have needed to go back out at night to try and pick them out of their new nests. Instead, since they didn't seem to have flown, I got to go to sleep, setting the alarm for 5 am. I woke up at 4:59 with a start because the first light of dawn penetrated my brain and made me think there was a chance I'd overslept. I made coffee and got on the road by 5:20 am. As I drove towards the intersection of Sunrise and Skyline roads, I started to see the little forms of ant bodies flying through the air: an auspicious sign.
When I reached one of our sweet spots along Sunrise, I knew I was right: perfect timing to catch a big swarm.
Field notes for myself: Swarm began shortly before 5:30 am, so shortly after sunrise. It continued to grow until around 6 - 6:15 am, with a fairly even sex ratio. Queens and males would fall to the ground to mate, and then they would fly up again into the swarm. I was thinking I'd wait until queens started to tear their wings off, but as time went on, the swarm became more and more male-biased, until the ants on the ground largely consisted of big balls of males mobbing a small number of queens. Therefore I conclude that after they've mated, the majority of queens fly away from the swarm to nearby locations to search for places to start new nests. Walking around the immediate vicinity of the swarm location, I did not encounter any queens starting to dig, confirming my sense that the swarm location is not surrounded by ideal leafcutter habitat.
As the swarm wound down, I drove over to the corner of Sunrise and Swan, stopping in at a convenience store to use the restroom and get some chocolate milk. When I drove to Swan the night before, I discovered that the road has changed a ton in the last couple of years, with a lot of new developments having gone in. That has also meant that places where I've searched in the past aren't so fruitful anymore. Regardless, I walked up a stretch of road to see what I could find. As I returned down the road back towards the car, I hit a second jackpot: a patch of desert landscape that was perfect nest-starting ground. So in addition to collecting a number of queens out of the mating swarm, I was also able to collect 60 queens as they started digging new nests (means they are fully mated).
Then: back to my aunt's house for breakfast/brunch and more time catching up (so amazing to get to catch up with family!!), back on the road to Phoenix, to the lab to set up what nests I could, to the house to pick up the students, to the airport to drop off the rental car just in time, and then RG picked us up for some pool time at the Graduate and a Fourth of July fish BBQ feast at their house.
I'm not sure the feast or crowd were quite the cup of tea for the students for a Fourth of July experience, but that is what it is.
Now back to the lab.
Then, campus. I finished prepping the leafcutter nest dishes that I'd brought with me to Arizona and attended to the seed-harvester ant queens. Then back to the house by way of the auto repair shop, where I picked up the Honda with its new radiator. When I got to the house, I checked the oil and noted the oil level was still low, so I walked back over to the closest gas station and picked up a couple more quarts of oil. Put those in, packed a couple things up, then told my smart-o-phone to point me to Tucson whilst avoiding the highways, and got on the road.
I made it about 5 miles when the engine coughed hard and blew a bunch of smoke. I somehow got myself into a left-turn lane at Broadway and McClintock, waved people around me, and sat through a light cycle with the engine off. When the arrow turned green again, I managed to limp the car into a shaded parking spot at a Burger King and then called my uncle.
While I waited for the tow truck, I booked a rental car from the airport rental place (nothing else open due to the holiday weekend) and put my bike back together (borrowing a bike from a friend). Instead of just taking the light rail over, I decided to bike there, not realizing that the airport rental car place is a whole separate facility several miles further down the road from the airport.
Regardless - made it there, stuffed the bike into the rental car, and got on the road to Tucson. I made it there by 6:30, which was enough time to drive the usual roads and check to see whether there was evidence of queens having already flown. Seeing none, I drove back to my aunt's house, where she spoiled me with a lavish and delicious dinner at a Mexican restaurant. I can't even begin to describe how wonderful it was to get to catch up with her and my cousin D. They have been so good to me over the years, and it was also a real treat for them to get to catch up because they haven't been able to go much of anywhere. My cousin D is on immune-suppressing drugs and still has to be extremely careful about It.
If the queens had already flown, I would have needed to go back out at night to try and pick them out of their new nests. Instead, since they didn't seem to have flown, I got to go to sleep, setting the alarm for 5 am. I woke up at 4:59 with a start because the first light of dawn penetrated my brain and made me think there was a chance I'd overslept. I made coffee and got on the road by 5:20 am. As I drove towards the intersection of Sunrise and Skyline roads, I started to see the little forms of ant bodies flying through the air: an auspicious sign.
When I reached one of our sweet spots along Sunrise, I knew I was right: perfect timing to catch a big swarm.
Field notes for myself: Swarm began shortly before 5:30 am, so shortly after sunrise. It continued to grow until around 6 - 6:15 am, with a fairly even sex ratio. Queens and males would fall to the ground to mate, and then they would fly up again into the swarm. I was thinking I'd wait until queens started to tear their wings off, but as time went on, the swarm became more and more male-biased, until the ants on the ground largely consisted of big balls of males mobbing a small number of queens. Therefore I conclude that after they've mated, the majority of queens fly away from the swarm to nearby locations to search for places to start new nests. Walking around the immediate vicinity of the swarm location, I did not encounter any queens starting to dig, confirming my sense that the swarm location is not surrounded by ideal leafcutter habitat.
As the swarm wound down, I drove over to the corner of Sunrise and Swan, stopping in at a convenience store to use the restroom and get some chocolate milk. When I drove to Swan the night before, I discovered that the road has changed a ton in the last couple of years, with a lot of new developments having gone in. That has also meant that places where I've searched in the past aren't so fruitful anymore. Regardless, I walked up a stretch of road to see what I could find. As I returned down the road back towards the car, I hit a second jackpot: a patch of desert landscape that was perfect nest-starting ground. So in addition to collecting a number of queens out of the mating swarm, I was also able to collect 60 queens as they started digging new nests (means they are fully mated).
Then: back to my aunt's house for breakfast/brunch and more time catching up (so amazing to get to catch up with family!!), back on the road to Phoenix, to the lab to set up what nests I could, to the house to pick up the students, to the airport to drop off the rental car just in time, and then RG picked us up for some pool time at the Graduate and a Fourth of July fish BBQ feast at their house.
I'm not sure the feast or crowd were quite the cup of tea for the students for a Fourth of July experience, but that is what it is.
Now back to the lab.
no subject
Date: 2021-07-05 04:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-07-05 06:05 pm (UTC)I like riding bicycles. Failure tends to be less catastrophic, and less expensive.
no subject
Date: 2021-07-05 06:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-07-05 07:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-07-06 12:17 am (UTC)