Saturday 20 October 2007

Creepy Crawleys!

Like many people I know, I enjoy being out in the garden in the early morning. The camera came with me today (I don't always take it...it kind of seems to change the way I look at the world) and what a good thing. On the underside of leaves on both a grevillea and a banksia,I found spectacular ants' nests.

**WARNING** If you don't like creepy crawleys, look away now!**

My blood still goes cold even uploading these photos...they were big ants, about 8mm, long. They had built the nests from what looked like sawdust or something similar, and the nests were quite solid. I tried to poke into them with a stick ( eeerrggghhh) , but the stick didn't make any impression.


The curled-up leaf below, closest to the camera, is about 22cm long, and the nest on the underside is about 12cm long.

The photo below shows the underside of the same leaf....the nest was about 5cm wide, and about 4 cm high. There was a little tunnel down one side of it, so the ants could come and go.

OOOOOooo..my skin is still crawling.!!!

7 comments:

Neva said...

This really does make my skin crawl.....you and Jules.....no creepy crawlies for me!!!!

Jules said...

I knew neva would flip out with this post - I was going to say in my post - DON"T SHOW NEVA but Abrahm would love it and i bet he can tell you all about it.

Up here we get red ants that bite you and then after the pain has gone away it is really itchy for about 2 weeks - hate those little buggars!!!

Marie said...

I find that fascinating. I am not afraid at them :-))) Their society is so well organized....

Cabacurl, I have answered your comment on my blog about war memorials. But I have called you Lynette. I am sorry for that...... :-)

Anonymous said...

http://justayin-rob.blogspot.com/

Hi CabaC,
This is Robyn's web address. You will really like it.

Were these ants in your garden? 8mm - what we used to call an "inch ant". We have some nests too, down by our creek and I always make care not to disturb them. Their sting is excruciating and, as jules says, the itching can last for ages. Yuk!

Lynette said...

Well, I'm not fond of creepy crawlies, but I think these are some great photos. Congratulations of the bravery I know it took to stand there and take them!

And thanks for visiting my lengthy random facts' post. That took some bravery, too!

NorthBayPhoto said...

Wow! I'm not scared of creepy crawlies but by the same token I don't exactly want to be that close to them either!

Great photo and nerves to stand there and take the photo!

Thanks for visiting my NorthBayPhoto blog.

DeepBlueSea said...

thanks for dropping by my little blog...
cheers from melbourne!