La Jungle est vivant avec des Fourmis Safari
The Jungle is alive with Safari Ants
This is often the case. One moment you are walking down a quiet path or sitting breathlessly still, waiting for that new sunbird species to show itself. The next you find yourself amongst hundreds of thousand tenacious little invertebrates.
It’s a pretty uncomfortable experience to say the least but if you’re quick it’s not the end of the world!
One often hears the horror stories of ants plaguing their way through villages in far off forests and jungles. They seem to hold a fierce reputation. This is rightly so. There are even reports of human deaths as well as live stock devastation. One would imagine it’s the very old, very young or very sick which are incapable of moving to save themselves from the vicious mandibles of these dynamic predators. I’ve heard people say if ants were the size of Labradors they’d be the top predator in the world. I think that perhaps if this were the case there would be little world left. A Dormouse sized ant would be hard enough to deal with, heaven forbid a Hyrax sized ant. From the sounds of it, it’s mainly the unfortunate and forgotten chickens locked up for the night that stand little chance of escape from the formidable Dorylus as their owners flee to safety.
Dorylus is the genus that this type of Old World Driver Ant belong to. It is one of amongst about 60, of the most aggressive type of Driver Ant in the world.
There are many different lay-man names for the Genus of this Formicidae.
It is to be expected. They expand over three continents. Africa, Asia and South America. The Swahili name for them is Siafu. In Gabon it is Mannia. But you can imagine the French, Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese all have a special name for this remarkable creature.
I first experienced them in Guinea, West Africa where I spent several months crashing around the Upper Guinean forests on a motorbike. I would travel out each day and often for several at a time with just a few French loafs, tins of sardines a GPS and my hammock. I remember one day waking up with my hammock totally covered with these feisty ants. They had started chewing through the fine nylon mesh of my hammock and were dropping onto me. It was actually quite scary and a painful disaster trying to extract myself out of the hammock. The ants were everywhere.
I would always try and swerve by bike to miss their mass movements 1) because I didn’t want to upset them, I hate upsetting nature. 2) Because I didn’t want to upset them and then have them flicked all over my back by the rear wheel of the bike!
Between Safari Ants, Tsetse Flies and African Honey Bees I had some pretty spectacular motorbike crashes. Luckily I was a million miles away from anyone else so there was no damage to others just myself the bike and GPS. The specified insects would find themselves in the most inconvenient places over my body where, I’m sure they would wait until I was in the thickest sand, trying to cross a small river - stream or just pretending to be Valentino Rossi of the bush, then sting, bite or plunge their proboscis deep into my flesh. This would result in every muscle in my body contracting and reacting; the bike would often disappear from under me. Hurtling off in one-way and I would be left flapping dramatically and bracing for a landing in another.
During my recent trip to Gabon and I was reunited with these fascinating creatures and often at the wrong end too. Whether walking around the forest or just minding ones own business in camp there was no escaping the Safari Ants once they had set their minds in a certain direction, whether they were moving eggs and larvae or out on a mass hunt, YOU have to move around them and very carefully.
It is fascinating to watch them pick up vibrations and threats from their surroundings. They have such a complex, dynamic and intergraded life that I found myself totally enthralled by these Arthropods. So focused on their individual job, but as soon as something threatens their colony, column or migration they act in a matter of seconds.
Soldiers stand aggressively tall, mandibles shiny, menacing and agape, prone. Workers rush to get the eggs and larvae out of the way. Every-one of their antae waving provocatively to pick up the pheromones and signals to work out the next move.
You have to admire their tenacity and spirit. Their inherent sense of protecting the nest and one another at all cost. I certainly do and I am looking forward to the next time our paths cross.
La Jungle est vivant avec des Fourmis Safari