Cailie Michaelson, age 11, of Kearns, Utah, for her question:
HOW CAN ANTS CARRY THINGS LARGER THAN THEMSELVES?
More ants live on the earth than any other insect. And scientists tell us there are more than 15,000 different species living in ail parts of the world except near the North and South poles. Ants are very strong muscularly.
Ants often accomplish seemingly impossible feats of strength. There's no problem for them when it comes to moving objects that are much larger than themselves. A harvester ant, for example, can lift up out of a tunnel a pebble that weighs 52 times its own weight. And it does this job with its teeth. At this rate, a man would be able to lift nearly four tons!
It would appear that an ant is stronger than a man but this isn't the case. Strength does not increase proportionately with size. The strength of an ant's muscle is proportional to the area of a cross section of the muscle.
A large animal does not have the proportionate strength of a small one. If an ant were to become as large as a man, its strength would not have increased proportionately.
An insect's jumping ability presents a similar situation. A flea, for example, with legs only 1/20th of an inch long, can broad jump about a foot and high jump nearly eight inches. Thus, in theory, a flea, if it were enlarged to the size of man, would be able to broad jump about 700 feet and high jump 450 feet.
The champion insect jumper is the grasshopper, which can broad jump about 30 inches. With the same capability, a man would be able to hop the length of two football fields.
People often jump to the conclusion that since insects can seemingly achieve fantastic feats of strength, they must have muscles of ama'zing power. Insects do indeed have powerful muscles. But this is just part of nature's wonderful plan. An insect's muscle strength is due largely to the manner in which its muscles are attached.
There is absolutely no correlation between muscular power and animal size.
You can learn much about ants by keeping them indoors. The easiest way is to put them in a dish or plate. Set the dish in a pan of water. The ants cannot escape because they cannot swim.
To find your ant colony, look under old boards or fiat rocks, or in the soil of your lawn or garden. Carefully scoop up soil and ants on a towel, and then slide them into the dish. Feed your colony with bits of bread soaked in syrup, scraps of meat and dead insects such as flies. Give the ants a wet sponge to suck, or put water in a jar lid.
A better nest can be made of two panes of glass placed side by side and bound together in a wooden frame. Fill the thin space between the two layers of glass with soil, so the ants can dig their tunnels and rooms. By using glass sides you can see into the nest and watch the ants at work.
A cage of this type must stand on small blocks of wood or stone which are placed in a shallow pan of water. This keeps the ants from straying.