Did you notice? I had my suspicions last week that something was occuring when a little ant hitched a lift on my sleeve: the ants were active. Then, as I stood sweating in the sweltering heat at Clapham Junction station yesterday, with the air full of flying insects, tiny dots scurrying across the train tracks and, alas, several squashed bodies on the platform, I knew what day it was. Flying Ant Day!
'Flying Ant what?' I hear you ask. Flying Ant Day! Come on. No?
So what is it? Well basically it's when a queen ant come out of the ants' nest, meets a nice man ant and flies away to start a new colony. But it's not just one queen ant. It's about a bajillion.
OK, I confess, I am a country bumpkin. Country bumpkins know Flying Ant Day. We see where the ants' nests are and we catch them all busying themselves in blustering activity days before the big event. We see the queen ants flying away, as far as they can go, to start new colonies with all of the normal ants watching from below and we see the carnage on the streets showing all the ants that didn't make it. And a lot don't make it. Take a look at the path as you pound the pavement. Squished little flying ants as far as the eye can see. Sometimes little ants come out to retrieve the bodies of the fallen and, I'm speculating here, take them back to the nest to give them an ant funeral.
I love Flying Ant Day. It's a brilliant demonstration of the perserverence, planning and compassion of one of my favourite animals: the ant. Keep your eyes open and, more importantly, watch your step! You could be stepping on the future queen of an ant colony.