James Folds, age 11 of Atlanta, Georgia, for his question:

Do ants have bones?

By bones, we mean the hard skeletons within our bodies. Since all the higher animals also have bones, we find it hard to imagine how a creature can manage without them. Nevertheless, the insects and countless other small forms of life have no bones, no internal skeletons. Ants have no bones, since they are insects,

Internal bones provide our bodies with support. Without them we would be a mass of jelly unable to move. The ant's body is provided with external, or outside support, h11 insects are clothed in a tough casing. It may be a thick leathery skin or a hard brittle material like beetle wings called chitin. The joints are rings of elastic hide at which points the insect can bend its body as we bend a knee or an elbow. The joints are worked by muscles fixed onto the inside of the casing.

A tough coat is sufficient to keep the organs of a small animal in place. But it would not serve a larger animal. Hence:, all the animals without an internal s'releton are small, or fairly small.