BUYING ANTS TO WORRY BEETLES

Dominion, Volume 22, Issue 79, 27 December 1928, Page 12

BUYING ANTS TO WORRY BEETLES

. “Without Black Ants No Cocoa.” This sign in both Dutch and Javanese is posted at the entrance of a great coco plantation in Central Java. And this appeal to the natives does not go unheeded, for they turn in some 4,000,000 of the nests of these little creatures every year and receive in . return the gratifying sum of 10,000 or 20,000 gulden. It must not be supposed that the ants are destroyed. On the contrary, they are carefully cherished, and the reason is explained' in “Die Umschau” (Frankfort), which quotes Dr R. Menzel in the “Anzeiger fur SehadImgskunde,” thus

On the Javanese coco plantations are found numerous colonies of the black coco ant, which lives only upon trees infested by the white coco louse. The trees are not injured either by the white louse or the black ant which preys upon it. The real enemy of the trees is a certain beetle, helopeltis, which also attacks the tea plant. But two Dutch investigators, I. C. van der Meer Mohr and P. van der Goot, who made a study of the subject, demonstrated that when the black ants are present the helopeltis fails to injure the trees. Apparently this sapsucking pest is disturbed by the activity of the rushing ants, which, however, do not attack tlie beetle.

When he received a report of this the superintendent of the plantation, Siloewok Fawangan, determined not only to protect the black ants but to import them. Further, he carefully provided food for them by picking the white loco lice from the shells of the fruit where they congregated and placing them on the coco-trees to attract the arts and thus put the beetles to rout. The natives were paid to bring in the ants. In those localities where the little insects live the Javanese workers hung up nests made by fastening together into rough bags the broad leaves of the banana plant. Those bags make homes which the ants find exactly to their taste. In order to facilitate the pilgrimages of the ants from tree to tree the latter are connected with strands of bamboo for bridges. The worst enemy of the black ant is another variety of ant from which it must be carefully protected.