Meeting Abstract
The study of pesticides and other agrochemicals on insect behavior is an important and active area of research. During a recent trip to Lesvos, Greece we took the opportunity to determine if ants (Camponotus sp.) will build a defensive wall around a pesticide under natural conditions. We placed a three-well circular ant trap (active ingredient: sodium cacodylate) with a single reservoir of poison connecting the wells together, but separate tabs preventing feeding from the three well openings. We placed this in the path of an ant colony, and documented for 16 days i.e. morning and evening (3 days undisturbed, 3 days unopened, 4 days one tab, 4 days second tab). We turned new tabs to face ant activity. Then another ant trap is placed with all wells closed. In the control period we only saw minimal addition of dirt to the surrounding area. Once the traps were open it took 1-2 days to see significant building around the trap. The exploratory ant trap had a pile of plant material placed along the side of the ant trap that bordered the main ant trail. Other traps saw the placement of dirt in the wells. Other wells saw no building ant activity at all. The colonies from the exploratory site and site #1 both clearly exhibited building activity against the ant trap. Site #4 had no building activity. Sites #2 and #3 both only plugged the wells with dirt. We also noticed colony entrances at sites #2 and #3 both moved about a foot away from their original placement. This would be critical information for dealing with the Red Fire Ant which costs billions of dollars in management & damages. Another experiment must be done to view this behavior more thoroughly. This research was supported by NSF REU grant 1560389 and NSF PIRE grant 1545803 and performed at Skala Kalloni Greece.
