Jasper Ridge Field Ant - Ariana Baltay

Ariana Baltay

MLA 326, Prof. Siegel

Spring 2018

4-7-2018

                        Field Ants and Habitat: Jasper Ridge Field Trip Write Up

         As our class meandered along a path through the upper edge of the Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve, located in Portola Valley above Stanford University’s campus in the eastern foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains, we looked out over more than a thousand acres of teeming natural habitat. The privilege of exploring this untrammeled research area was awe inspiring and rewarding for our project of photographing and researching the inhabiting species there. We moved slowly and saw flowers, trees, rocks and life all around us. A quiet, life-filled buzz seemed to fill the air, a communion of insects, the rustle of wind as it moved leaves and branches, and organisms from birds and toads, snakes and lizards, woodpeckers, owls, and other birds. Our fist large bird sighting was of a turkey Vulture that circled gracefully above our heads. He looked magnificent although Prof. Siegel commented that we would not think he was so beautiful if we saw him up close. We were on a mission to produce a photo we could share and learn from and it had to be good enough to present to the class. For many of us who were not expert camera hands, managing camera settings was a challenge compounded by identifying species and deciding how best to present them to others. Thanks to the rich rewards of Jasper Ridge, all found an exciting topic. Mine was the field ant, and the amount which I learned about it was a waterfall I had not envisioned when I first saw the small creature in his busy community in his under-rock home.

     The photograph I chose from this experience was of a field ant who had crawled onto a stick that raised him above his teeming community of ants and larvae. He lived under a knee height  boulder. The bright moss and lichen that covered the rock complemented the bright red colors of the ants, making the sight rich in color and stunning natural beauty. I also liked the ant as my subject because of the excitement of the moving workers who darted eerily with the movement of a spider. For the main photo selected I used a zoom lens because the ants were small and I did not wish to get too close. There was lightly filtered light so I used a medium ISO of 400, an aperture of ten, and a speed of 1/80th of a second. As I was startled by the initial discovery, I rushed to take multiple shots. For a few seconds I just kept snapping, while adjusting settings a bit to be sure to capture a good shot. I did want to interfere with their movement by putting anything in their path, so I was lucky to capture the ant selected. I did not know I had gotten a shot of him until later.

   At home, I scanned each photo using the enlarged viewer on the computer, and in this way I discovered the one ant that displayed my story. It seemed telling that he was vertical and stretched out his arms and legs like a person. It took quite a while to hunt along the crowds of busy ants portrayed until I found a single ant in focus that I could highlight.I cropped around the ant so that he filled the shot, allowing me to see his double segmented body, pointed beak, and pearly grey lined hind body.

      It took hours of comparing close up of Jasper Ridge Ants to identify this ant’s species, Formica Moki. Several close relatives appeared like the ant in my photo. Only by tracing the descriptions of behavior, and size carefully could I be sure to identify the right species of ant. This was made based on the number of segments of his body, his quick and aggressive behavior, his red color and silver back end, and his size, which was quite large compared to the usual household ant, about 6 mm.

    I most enjoyed the contrast between the internet photos of dead, limp ants that appeared as if pinned, as if lying limp and hunched on a slide. The Field Ant my chosen photo depicts is of a specimen in his own habitat, a richly colored home of ochre yellows, bright greens, and earthy chocolate browns. His bright red body glowed and flashed with energy as he worked near bright white larvae. Although I was a bit put off at first sight of thes crawling insects, I learned much about their food, numbers, behaviors, and invasive Argentine Ant neighbors. Taking a photo and researching its subject proved to be an excellent way to build awareness of this bountiful natural reserve.

  -- Ariana Baltay