archrivals of ants in the kinds of food and space they require, proved to be all-purpose fighters. They were not only armored, poisonous, and swift on the ground, but also capable of taking flight if stressed--and, finally, as a last resort, they had jaws sharp and powerful enough to chop an ant in two during insect-to-insect combat.
The Woodlander huntresses did best with the few prey available that were soft, slow, and tasty. When a Woodlander came upon a fallen caterpillar or some other invertebrate that met these exacting standards--in other words, not poisonous, did not strike out with slashing jaws or flee with the equivalent speed of a drag racer, and not least was big enough to be worth the effort--her response was enthusiastic. She reported her find to the colony by laying a chemical odor trail back to the nest and tapping her nestmates with rapid strokes of her forelegs. Out came the alerted workers, and if they found the prey attractive themselves, they attacked. If the prey was so big it could fling a single worker away, it could still be overcome by a swarm of workers rushing it simultaneously.
In one episode that occurred during the exploration of their new territory, a Woodlander force was summoned to the nymph of a mole cricket. While immature, it was still the same size compared to a worker as a cow is to a human. The first dozen workers who arrived proved sufficient for the kill. Several of the attackers were able to pin the still-active cricket nymph by seizing and spreading its legs, while others stung it in vulnerable seams between its chitinous armor plates.
Another target discovered by the Woodlander scouts, the prize of the week, was the grown caterpillar of a cecropia moth, the equivalent in size to the ants as a whale is to humans. Hundreds of workers, accompanied by a score of soldiers this time, were needed to subdue the monster and drag it back to the nest.
The Woodland Colony used the same method to claim and retrieve large, already dead animals before rivals could preempt them. The reward in calories for winning such a bonanza could be enormous. On one occasion a worker force was gathering around the newly discovered corpse of a lizard. It had been led there by one of its most enterprising elite scouts. The prize contained enough food to support the colony for days. Suddenly, however, the bonanza was discovered by a squad of fire ants. The enemy, recruited by their own scouts from a distant colony, did what fire ants do best. They quickly gathered in strength and attacked anything that moved. And they were formidable in combat, especially in groups. A battle was joined, and soon the dead and injured piled up on both sides. The Woodlanders managed to prevail, mainly because their nest was close by and their buildup of fighting forces faster. The presence of soldiers also helped: the members of this larger caste not only stung the fire ants fatally but also used their razor-sharp jaws to clip them into pieces. The fighting Woodlanders were able to clear the lizard's body of fire ants and drag it inch by inch to their own nest.
By this time the Woodland Colony had an adequate military force. Each of its hoplite soldiers was a formidable fighting machine, not only in defense of the colony, but as an escort for workers retrieving food. Its body was thick and muscular. Its head was huge in proportion to the body and was heart-shaped. The swollen posterior lobes were filled with adductor muscles that closed the jaws with enough force to cut through the chitinous exoskeleton and muscle of most kinds of insects. The inner margin of each jaw was lined with a row of eight sharp teeth. The tooth at the tip of the mandible was the longest, serving as a dagger to stab opponents and a hook to seize and hold them while others moved in. The pair of spines extending backward from the upper surface of the middle of the body protected the soldier's thin waist, making it difficult for the ant to be cut in half during combat.
The brain of a soldier was wired for battle. In a gland at the base of each jaw, each carried quantities of alarm pheromones ready to be spritzed into the air when the ant met an enemy. When challenged, the soldier not only produced more of these substances than did an ordinary worker,