Unidentified ant on Peony

[urbpan]

I sent this photo to bugguide.net to hopefully identify the species of ant but I haven't heard anything yet. This is the time of the year that the ants hang around on the developing peony buds, feeding on nectar that forms on the outside. Folk biology claims that ants are needed for the proper development of the flower, but this is not true. It's fairly likely (but hard to prove or disprove) that the ant and the plant are not even from the same continent, and that the observed relationship is a relatively new opportunism.

Comments

also opportunism: peonies and haiku!

[grrlpup]

a red peony
the gate of the ant kingdom
opens wide

(Buson, d. 1783.)

[urb-banal.livejournal.com]

Ooh, I loved that myth! I have peonys and they always openned in time for the kids to take to a teacher on the last day of the school year. My daughter would pick up the ants and put them on the buds thinking that it would mean they would open faster.

[urbpan.livejournal.com]

Whoops, sorry.

[callipygian80.livejournal.com]

Makes me miss the peonies we had at our old house.