> I was interested in Allen's reference to Fire ants having
> apparently recently developed the routine acceptance of multiple
> queens. I wonder can anyone expand on this topic. How recently is recent?
Try http://www.agrinc.com/antfact1.htm
"Everything you ever wanted to know about THE IMPORTED FIRE ANT" has
the following quote on the third page:
> Fire ants have been mutating to fit their environment since their
> introduction into the United States. Multiple Queen Colonies are a
> mutation problem that is very hard to control. This type of mutation
> appears to be caused by the heavy usage of toxic chemicals in the
> United States. Eradicating a multiple queen colony is a very difficult
> taks in order to kill all queens at once. Colonies in the originating
> countries were not of the multiple queen variety....
More sources are:
http://sciboard.louisville.edu/news/scinews/bioins/fireants.htmhttp://agnews.tamu.edu/stories/ENTO/baitants.htmhttp://www.bhip.com/business/25ants.htm
From the quote above, I guess we just need to use more chemicals if we
want to get multiple queen varieties, eh?
Allen
PS" If you haven't tried searching the web lately, it's AMAZING what's
out there. There are (a variety of) answers for any question you could
imagine somewhere on the web.
Most current browsers have a 'search' feature that is easy to use and gets
more 'hits' on any topic than you're likely to want to read.
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