High Hopes
With the onset of Autumn, we are filled with “high hopes” of more migrating hawks, the changing of the forest colors, and cooler days and nights. We had many more birders than birds today in anticipation and hopes of an influx of migrating Broadwinged hawks. As we mentioned before, Mother Nature is not always so accommodating and today was a great example of that. We had next to no birds moving through. Be it the ominous weather, winds out of the “wrong” direction, or simply a change in migration pattern, we were once again thwarted in our attempts to witness the fall migration. What we did see, however, was an example of an insect that is the exemplification of “High Hopes”… the tiny ant.
As we sat with eyes to the skies, one of our number noticed a piece of lettuce moving along the ground at a steady pace under one of the chairs. A closer examination lead to the discovery of one of nature’s most ambitious creatures, the Field ant. This little insect had found some debris that had fallen from one of our sandwiches and was quickly taking it back to her colony. I use the pronoun “her” because in the ant world, most of the work outside the colony is done by females. The ant we discovered today was Formica pallidelfulva more commonly known as the Field ant.
Variable field ant Bear Mt Hawkwatch 9/23/25 Nikon Z8 with Z100-400 mm zoom @ 400mm 1/400 sec, f/10, ISO 640
The Field ant is a species of ant native to North America. It is characterized by its reddish-tan coloration and relatively large size compared to other ants in the Formica genus. These ants typically inhabit open fields and forest edges, where they build mound-shaped nests in soil. Their behavior includes foraging during the day and aggressive defense of their territory. The reason for the title of this post relates to what this ant was doing today. The source of the lettuce she was carrying was a good 15 feet from its source (my wife’s tuna sandwich). She had carried it through our “crowd” and was beginning ascend the vertical face of a boulder. She climbed up that vertical face before losing her grip and falling back to the ground. She never let loose of her prized food supply. She quickly resumed her climb and again gained about two feet off the ground before making a left turn and continuing along the face of the boulder for another foot or two before again losing her grip. Once back on the ground, she continued to carry the lettuce until disappearing under leaf litter. These ants are known to nest beneath leaf litter so it is possible that she was returning to the nest at this point.
Perspective is everything. I am 5’10” tall or 280X the size of that ant. The lettuce shard that she is carrying is aproximately 6 times longer that she is or 1.5”. Using that 280X factor to put everything into my human realm, that lettuce that I would be carrying would be 420” (35 feet) long. She pulled that vegetation straight up a boulder more than two feet. That’s 96 times higher than she is long. Again, doing the math, I would have to carry my 35 foot long piece of lettuce straight up a vertical cliff about 560 feet to match her accomplishment! Amazing what “High Hopes” can do for you!
So here’s to our ant friend! If she had “High Hopes’ and accomplished what she did, then we at the watch will continue to have the same and anticipate increased activity on the mountain. Stay tuned and see if those high hopes come to fruition.
