Ants come in many differens forms, from flying ants to fire ants, to the common variety of ants found in your home attacking crumbs. But we focus most of our time on killing ants or ant pest control solutions. So, this amazing insect doesn’t really get the credit it deserves. Read on to learn more about ants.

What prompted me to write a blog post about ants? Well, after being bitten numerous times in my garden in Thailand by Thai red fire ants, I was amazed by how well organised they were. For some reason they are a lot more organised than English ants I see when I am back in England. When I chopped a tree branch down recently I noticed that they attacked in formation. When I changed position by standing in a different place, they about-turned and followed me. I also found that they had round nests in the trees. Up to this point I didn’t know that certain species of ants made ant nests in trees that look like birds’ nests from a distance.

I also found out that these Thai red ants are not poisonous, so they do a clever, and not very beautiful act once they’ve bitten you . . . They then turn around and urinate in the bite wound. Not a great feeling, being urinated on by an ant but fascinating all the same.

Then I was stung by a dark red ‘Mot Da Nawy’ ant which really hurt. Swelling and redness in around a 3 inch diameter appeared after the sting. I say ‘sting’ because these ants are quite different, they sting you and inject their venom.

Then, after being urinated on by standard Thai red ants and stung by the dark red Thai ant, I was attacked by skydiving ants. Skydiving ants? Yes, it may be hard to believe, but I was sweeping up leaves when they started to drop out of the tree above me, biting my neck and going down my T. shirt. I abandoned the idea of sweeping up the leaves in the end and had a second shower that morning to make sure they were all off me. I wasn’t expecting them to use that tactic.

Even though I then had the entire garden sprayed with ant killing chemicals as they were on my case, I’ve got to give ants credit, as they are fearless, organised, clever and can communicate well with each other.

Anyway, here are some things I found out about ants. . .

Ants have an exoskeleton, their skeleton is on the outside, as opposed to our skeleton which is on the inside. In non-scientific terms we could maybe call this a skeletal shell, with their muscles attached to the shell. This exoskeleton also filters oxygen into the ant’s body as ants don’t have any lungs. They don’t have a heart as we’d recognise a heart. Instead they have a kind of dorsal tube that runs along the top of the length of the ant’s body that functions as a heart, called the ‘dorsal aorta’.

An ant’s vision isn’t great as most ants have low resolution vision. Their eyes have multiple lenses however and they even have three extra eyes on the top of their heads that can detect light levels. They have hooked claws at the end of their legs to enable them to climb.

Young worker ants spend the first part of their lives looking after the young and the queen, then when the ant is older and more expendable, it goes out foraging for food.

Queens can live for up to 30 years! And female worker ants can live from 1 – 3 years. The poor old male ants only live for a few weeks. The females have complete control over mating too. It’s a very female dominated ant society. They don’t have any suffragette movements going on in the ant world, no need.

Ants use pheromones to communicate, which is picked up by their sensitive antennas. An ant that finds a spilt orange juice drink on the floor can make its way back to the nest whilst leaving a pheromone trail on the ground for other ants to follow. This explains their almost regimental marching along a line type movements.

If you accidentally step on an ant, or just happen to accidentally burn one to a cinder with a magnifier glass, an alarm pheromone will be released sending nearby ants into a frenzied attack mode.

Central and South American bullet ants have a very painful sting. The pain is said to last for up to 24 hours and is meant to be one of the most painful stings in the world. These reddish coloured ants can be from 2 to 3 cms in length.

The Australian jack-jumper ant can be up to 4 cms in size and has superior vision when compared to other species.

Worker ants hunting for food can travel up to two hundred metres away from their nest. There are certain types of caterpillars that are carried away and massaged for the sweet secretions they produce upon being massaged, which the ants then eat. It must be like a free spa treatment for the lucky caterpillar.

It has been estimated that there are so many ants around that if you could weigh the whole human race and at the same time, all the ants in the world, the weights would be approximately the same.

The Spanish flu, that lasted from June 1917  – December 1920 was a worldwide pandemic. A ‘Pandemic flu’ is a flu that spreads worldwide. And indeed it did, killing an estimated 50 million people and infecting a quarter of the world’s population. Three percent of the world’s population were killed.

The virus targeted healthy young adults who had strong immune systems, as it’s method was to cause an overreaction in the immune system of the victim.

Why was it called Spanish Flu? Could victims Speak fluent Spanish and dance the Flamenco before popping off into the unknown? Obviously not. It was called ‘Spanish Flu’ because it was the first country to give the killer flu news coverage. The first cases were noted in Europe and America, but news coverage was strictly censored. This could be because mass troop movements during WW1 arguably helped spread the disease. After all, imagine signing up to fight with potentially infected soldiers. It wouldn’t have looked good on the ‘We Want You’ posters, let’s put it that way. Also, King Alfonso XIII became infected causing the media to highlight the threat of the disease even further. So, people believed that it began in Spain, whereas Spain in reality didn’t deserve to be linked to the roots of this disease.

Spanish flu came in several waves. It mutated into an even deadlier strain in the second wave, this time attacking the elderly and infants or those with weak immune systems.

The hardest hit area of the globe were the Pacific Islands, and the country least hit by fatalities was Japan, as the Japanese government restricted sea travel from Japan to other infected countries.

In time, the virus mutated to less lethal strains. As viruses are intelligent in a way and obviously wanted to reside in hosts who were actually staying alive. [Oh no, the Bee Gees song has started playing in my head and I can’t stop it! If I close my eyes all I can see are perfectly white teeth . . . ! ]

On a positive note there were many survivors, with some famous names included. Such as Walt Disney, Woodrow Wilson and even Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Our old friend the matchstick has become less popular to use in modern times. Instead people, more often than not,  prefer standard lighters or even flashy Zippo lighters which are seen as more convenient to carry around. Here we look at the ‘matchstick men’ and women who invented and produced the match. Solving the the ‘where did matches come from?’ matchstick puzzle.

However, there is something about lighting a match that is more pleasurable than using a lighter. The smell is different and it has an old fashioned feel to it, like reading an old book, dug out from the attic.

The term ‘match’ comes from lengths of cord that were soaked in flammable liquids and dried out to be used for canons and other uses. Some were slow burning and some were fast burning.

China could arguably be credited with the invention of the match. Fires were lit using pinewood coated with sulphur in China at around AD 577 by Northern Qi court ladies for starting fires.

The first appearance of the match in Europe was around the year 1530, so it only took us Europeans around 1000 years to catch on to the idea. Which is pretty quick when compared to the time it takes for a car insurance claim after a car accident in modern times.

The assistant French professor K. Chancel invented the the first self-igniting match. This match was costly and dangerously unstable to use. The head of the match was a mixture of potassium chlorite, sugar, rubber and sulphur.

John Walker, an English chemist invented the first friction matches using gum, stibnite and potassium chlorite. These matches were patented and marketed under the brand name ‘Lucifer’. These matches smelt terrible and exploded into flame, sending a shower of sparks raining down at long distances.

White phosphorous was added to the mixture in 1830. To function, these matches had to be stored in airtight containers. In each pack there was reportedly enough phosphorous to kill a person. The workers who produced the matches developed bone disorders. These matches were banned in the end. The manufacturers, not surprisingly, didn’t really care because they were making money, but it was the result of a campaign by the general public that eventually resulted in the ban.

In 1836 the noiseless match appeared, although this was not a great leap in innovation, unless you were a cigar smoking spy relying on silence and stealth.

White phosphorous was eventually phased out and replaced by the ‘safety match’. These days safety matches refer to matches that cannot be struck anywhere but on the box. However, back in those days it reassured people that they could use these matches without being poisoned by dangerous white phosphorous.

So, all the hard work by innovators of the past has resulted in a match that only ignites with the box, aka. ‘the safety match’, doesn’t have to be kept in an airtight container, doesn’t explode or shower everyone with sparks and is not poisonous.

And how does this impact on us today? How would I know? I use a lighter of course…

What follows are some interesting facts about Thailand that you may not know unless you’ve lived in Thailand for a number of years. These facts are outside the typical facts you usually hear and already know . . .

1) In Thailand it is sometimes presumed that all Thai people like to eat spicy food. But in fact, about 25% of Thai people don’t like their food to be too spicy.
2) When you buy something in Thailand you will sometimes see the seller swipe his or her goods with the banknote you gave over for the purchase as if dusting his or her products. This happens if you are the first customer of the day. It is seen as good luck to touch the rest of the goods in the store or selling booth with your banknote for further sales success.
3) Most people know that it is impolite to point your feet at someone or touch a Thai persons head, but did you know that it is considered ugly to put your bag on the floor? This is because the feet and floor are seen to be dirty and low. In fact, if you put your bag on the floor there will often be someone who will suggest that you put your bag on a chair instead.
4) On visiting Thailand you will immediately notice that there are many homeless dogs at the side of the road. The main reason for this is that it is considered a sin in most Thai people’s eyes to have their dog spayed.
5) If you flash the headlights of your car in the West, we will recognise this as someone giving way to let the other person go. However, it has the opposite meaning in Thailand. Flashing your headlights in Thailand means ‘I’m coming through, don’t get in my way!’
6) Crossing your fingers in the West usually indicates that you are wishing for something, or wishing for someone to have good luck. This is not the case with Thai body language interpretation, as crossing your fingers in front of your body as well as behind your body means that you are telling a lie.
7) Thai money is waterproof. Drop a banknote into some water and amaze your friends if your friends are easily entertained.
8 ) Anyone having a meal with Thai friends will notice that everyone is reluctant to start eating first. Being the first to dive in and eat can look mildly ugly and mildly greedy. A way to get around this is to agree to all start eating at the same time.
9) The Thai ‘dtua dtaw’ wasp (which is usually mistaken for a bee most of the time) is very dangerous. 7 stings can kill you. They do not usually attack unless provoked however. By the way, most Westerners will mistakenly call ordinary house lizards ‘geckos’ which is fine, but if you see a real gecko in Thailand you’ll see that it is very colourful and loud. Most Thai people are especially scared of geckos. These creatures are often associated with ghosts or just considered plain ugly.
10) Many Thai people wear gold (especially in the countryside) as savings for a rainy day as well as a symbol of wealth. Thai gold can be traded back in at any time for about a 90% return.