Antlab in Panama

<phew> Another long but satisfying day harvesting data on the gigante peninsula is over. I considered titling the post “And on the seventh day they rested…” however, I can’t really take credit for the thought. It’s Risa’s—and I hope she will decide to pen a blog post under that title. I’m sure it will be a good one.

I have a confession. When I first joined the lab, I never thought I’d want to study ants long term. My feelings at the time were well in with the characters in John Janovy Jr.’s Dunwoody Pond, who fell into the arms of biology in such a way that “they came and tried to find a small corner in science where they could make a mark. ‘What do you want to work on?’ I’d ask. ‘Something nobody else has worked on’ they replied”.

I suppose I also just wanted to work on something nobody else had. My feelings when I joined Mike’s lab was that ants were attractive to lots of people and the remaining questions (if there were any) would be predictable and hard to get at. What a strange thought this turned out to be in retrospect. What in my collective experience would qualify me to think this and to be so sure of myself? The confidence of the naïve, perhaps? I’m still not sure, but these feelings were my primary motivator at the time. I thought I’d probably work on a really obscure family of beetles or something far off the beaten path. Ah well.

Being new to ants is a strange thing. My interest in insects was at an all-time high when I first started working in the lab, but I had a feeling that the ants were in some way different—outside the range of typical entomologists—and I wasn’t sure I would be a good fit for them. The degree of social cooperation they display combined with the wonderful roles of chemical communication and behavior began taking a toll though, and I have become more and more interested in studying them as time has worn on. Large questions, such as the evolution of eusociality or social behavior, can be tackled with ants.

I’m glad that science is a curved path. I think about Mike and the many hats he has worn over the years—from ornithologist to ant biologist, community ecologist, and perhaps later he’ll even ‘dabble’ in microbial ecology. For me, an interest in insects was only the beginning. I’d enjoy working with ants. At dinner this evening I listened to a grad student lament about searching for coati all afternoon and not seeing one. I’ve never had that problem before…