I, For One, Welcome Our New Insect Overlords

Two bits of weirdness that came across my desktop yesterday (both thanks to Hyrum) …

According to a BBC article, there is a colony of Argentinean ants which has spread to nearly every corner of the earth. Yes, I said that right … I’m not saying the SPECIES has spread that far (it has, obviously, but that’s not so rare). What I’m saying is that the worldwide infestation considers itself to be one, big, united mega-colony.

First of all, they make these giant colonies that stretch (among other places) along ridiculously long stretches of the Californian, Mediterranean, and Japanese coasts. One big colony thousands-of-miles long … where workers from one end can be taken to the other end … and they just get right back to working without any fuss.

On top of that, the ants, it seems are VERY territorial and kill outside insects that come onto their turf. However, if one of these Argentinean ants from California is taken and placed into the mega-colony in Japan, the Japanese ants accept it … and the ant immediately gets right back to work.

They are, as the article says, the extent of this population is paralleled only by human society … and it seems clear that they are eventually going to take over.

If that wasn’t chilling enough, check out this video taken in a North Carolina sewer pipe.

As weird as that seems, it turns out they’re just an ordinary (if gross) colony of freshwater bryozoans (try saying THAT ten times fast).