We were alerted to the presence of the invaders when Cali went out back to check on her bird. \u201cMOM!\u201d she screamed, \u201cThey\u2019re going to get my bird! They are all over the bird cage!\u201d<\/p>\n
I went out to see just who \u201cthey\u201d might be. \u201cThey\u201d were swarms of ants. But not the normal ants. I observed that they were not at all interested in the bird\u2019s food dish. What were they looking for, anyways?<\/p>\n
So I called Jevon over to look at them. He confirmed my suspicion that they were army ants.<\/p>\n
The kids pretty much freaked out when they heard the fearsome name \u201carmy ants\u201d. Apparently they assumed the troops were coming to attack us, or at least the bird. \u201cDon\u2019t worry,\u201d I told Cali, \u201cyour bird can fly away if they are bothering him. Just don\u2019t shut him in the cage, and he\u2019ll be fine.\u201d<\/p>\n
We warned all of the kids to just leave the ants alone and not mess up their path. We tiptoed around them for the rest of the afternoon.<\/p>\n
Later, I went into the bathroom and saw them swarming in there. I got a new found respect for the creatures when I saw them taking down a wasp many times their size! One army ant was holding the monster by the head, and the wasp was twisting and flailing its body desperately around, trying to get it\u2019s stinger at the ant holding his head. Other ants came running up and surrounded the two, prepared to run in and help if need be.<\/p>\n
Leaving the bathroom, I went to the kitchen sink. Through the window, I could see the old water tower \u2013 the little one that was already here when we came (not the big, new one that Jevon just built a few months ago). Much to my surprise, troops of army ants were marching in lines up and down the tower, carrying out big oval shaped white lumps. \u201cWhat ARE those things? I asked myself. \u201cAre those carpenter ant eggs? Or larvae?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWhoa!\u201d Jevon yelled, from outside, \u201cIt is WAR out here under the tower!\u201d Sure enough, the carpenter ants were fighting desperately to defend their nest, but to no avail. The army ants were hauling away the offspring faster than the carpenter ants could hold them back. \u201cWoo hoo!\u201d Jevon rejoiced, \u201cThank you LORD!\u201d We had been killing carpenter ants in the house, thinking they must still have a hidden fortress somewhere, because we had been losing ground against them. We knew they liked to get in our electrical system and, of course, the wood that our house is made of. But we didn\u2019t know where their big nest was. The army ants did us a big favor!<\/p>\n
When the kids heard Jevon rejoicing, they took the army ants\u2019 side and started cheering them on. Later, they just about cried when they found two wounded soldiers left behind on the bathroom floor.<\/p>\n
Jevon\u2019s mom says that army ants carry off the cockroaches, too. I prayed that they would find any eggs that might be under our house or hidden in places I hadn\u2019t seen. The scouts, and the troops behind them, went through each of the rooms of our house, never bothering us at all except when Isaiah stepped on one. The one he stepped on took a big chomp on the side of his foot, but then, wouldn\u2019t you take a bite out of anybody who stepped on you, too? By night time they were just marching in 3 straight lines around the back of the house, and eventually disappeared into the night.<\/p>\n
Well, thank you, Lord, for sending your miniature army out of the jungle and into our house, to carry off the pests.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We were alerted to the presence of the invaders when Cali went out back to check on her bird. \u201cMOM!\u201d she screamed, \u201cThey\u2019re going to get my bird! They are all over the bird cage!\u201d I went out to see just who \u201cthey\u201d might be. \u201cThey\u201d were swarms of ants. But not the normal ants. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":552,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1466","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/552"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1466"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1466\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/jevon-rich\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}