Glutons

[srduggins]

These maxima upper pitchers are eating ants like crazy. The dark lower portion of these pitchers are full of ants.

I tried to get a pic of the inside and this is the best I could do so far.

 

[Capensis]

Wow, very impressive. How many pitchers are filled like that? Nice maxima, by the way.

 

[Wolfn]

The queen is wondering where all her workers are disappearing off to........

 

[D_muscipula]

That happened to me. The ants found my windowsill and the stream of ants continued steadily for about a month. Then the stream dried up.

 

[kentosaurs]

Wow thats A LOT of ants!!! I used to have an infestation of black ants but after awhile they just dissapeard....Probally they got wobbled up by my miranda and ventrata....

 

[TranMinh]

Hi,
Wow A lot of ants my mirabilis eats not that much ! really nice maxima !

 

[Adam]

The queen is wondering where all her workers are disappearing off to........

the same line is in the savage garden

 

[Tony Paroubek]

When I grew more plants at the house I would put my N. truncata out along the path of some ants and in short order they would be swarming all over the pitchers. Great fun to watch! lol

 

[srduggins]

Wow, very impressive. How many pitchers are filled like that?

That's actually two different clones and most of the pitchers (about 8/plant) are pretty full. Actually many of my pitchers are half-full of ants. It's just easier to see on these green maxima pitchers.

 

[Wolfn]

the same line is in the savage garden

I know

 

[seedjar]

Nice - I've got a similar situation on my bedroom rack. For a while we had ants living in the house, but I think the Neps have done such a good job on them that they wiped out the local populations. Now I find ant trails on the outside walls leading into my racks through the windowsill or the ventilation holes in the foundation.
They're so much fun to watch! This also reminds me of a question - do you ever see ants start to get a little clumsy or disoriented while feeding on nectar? The ones at my house seem to. But the weirdest part - and I'm wondering if anyone else has seen this - is that the "drunken" ants are often rescued from precarious situations by their more sober sisters. An ant will be dangling dangerously from a pitcher's peristome only to grasp mandibles with a nestmate and be hauled back to solid ground. Sometimes, the really messed up ones will be carried off by the others. (Maybe there's some kind of drunk tank back at the nest?) I'd never heard of this level of altruism among ants - could it be that there's some sort of "Help me, I'm falling!" scent signal at work? I'm very curious to know if any of you have seen or heard of this.
~Joe