Cornishman in Africa: Ants in Pants.

Beware the trouser ants.

I remember as a child my parents taking us on holiday and one day we were particularly excited to find out that they were taking us to Burnham Beaches.
My brother and I were chatting about whether the beaches would be the same as they were in our beloved Cornwall, would they be sandy and long like Hayle or pebbly and steep shelving.
As it turned out we were sorely disappointed when we found out that they were made of wood The beaches in question were beech trees.
We were gutted and the day only got worse as we had to go on a long walk. No buckets and spades no ice creams, just trees leaves and walking. Could this day get any worse?
Yes it could, whist walking along in my sandals (ideal beach wear, not so good for wood walking) I managed to get a piece of twig wedged in between my foot and the shoe. In an effort to dislodge the twig and hence alleviate the immediate discomfort I sat down on a very convenient two foot high mound that was neatly situated directly beside the path.
It was a lot more cushioning than I expected for a soil mound, and then the reason why became startlingly apparent.
I had just parked my bottom on a red ants nest, whist the ants were probably more than a little surprised that a ten year old boy had decided to sit on their beautifully made nest they were also a bit annoyed, and whist they invited me in, it was not for tea and biscuits it was more for a main meal. Theirs.
My parents duly hauled me out in floods of tears and brushed off as many of the hungry critters as they as they could.
Unfortunately it took a full humiliating undressing in the middle of the woods to get rid of all the ants that had decided to explore the inner sanctums of my clothing.
This was my first experience of ants at odds with me.
When we moved to Africa, insects were one of my wife’s biggest bugbears. (no pun intended)
But in reality when you have good friends around you who are keen to share their knowledge it does not take long to learn what to take a close look at and what to steer well clear of.
We moved from Zimbabwe to Zambia in 2006 and had a nice place in the bush.
It was basic but had all the main amenities as well as a large garden.
We tended to live outside on the veranda most of the time and often walked around the garden in the evenings.
One particular evening in January 2007 I was walking in the garden and stopped to take in the beauty of the whole place, in the half light as night is coming in fast there is much to see in the way of bird life and spectacular sunsets.
As the final rays reflect of the thunder clouds that are themselves exploding and glowing with internal electricity.
I probably stood there for about five minutes. When an incredibly excruciating pain burst forth from all around the tops of my legs and my nethers.
Because of the darkness I could see nothing to give clue to what could be causing this pain, so I started to walk to the house. The pain immediately increased, so I stated to run, the pain intensified again.
I started to rip off my trousers and looking down realised the cause of all this fuss.
There were about three hundred 1 - 1.5cm long, large headed and even larger pincered ants attacking my legs and bits.
Sharon wondered what on earth I was doing. Never before in our 15 years of marriage had she seen me get my kit off quite so quickly, let alone do it at a full sprint.
Once relieved of my garments I started to brush them off, but they just don’t let go, they would rather relinquish the grip on their heads than they would on me and my bits.
By this time I was in the kitchen, Sharon had realised that this was not some strange new courtship I had developed but was in fact in pain, and it was not going away, so she came to help. (Albeit in fits of laughter) You can imagine the scene (it’s not a pretty one) Sharon and I having to prize off the remaining ants and heads by dislodging their pincers, it took a while but we got there in the end.
We subsequently found out that these are fire ants, or soldier ants and I am sure they have many other names too, I thought of quite a few that night.
They leave there nests to move or to hunt for food, They travel in huge columns miles long and about 8 cm wide and they are unstoppable. If you stand in their path they don’t bother to go round you they go through you.
They have been known to devour an entire chicken house full of birds in one night.
They will travel through a house clearing out any living thing in it, any scraps or molecules of food they may come across. When they attack humans you don’t feel them coming either.
They don’t just bite your ankles, they are very fleet of foot, and rush up your legs to where it gets warm, wait till there is a good couple of hundred of them there, knives and forks at the ready, then send a signal, and all dive in, in unison.
The next encounter we had with these was when we were camping up at Ndubuluba in the North of Zambia. It was early morning and the sun had not yet raised it’s head above the horizon and Sharon stepped out of the tent stretched and took in the beauty of the morning. A couple of minutes later, off came the clothes and amid a mass of flapping brushing off and swearing, I realised exactly what had happened and went to help.
The reason I thought of this story now is that the little blighters got me again last night as I was standing at the bar. Luckily these were smaller ones and not so many, but still not good.
Whilst they are not pleasant to be on the receiving end of they are fascinating creatures. We have since come to know them as trouser ants, because if you suddenly see someone ripping off their strides for no apparent reason, there is a pretty good chance that they have got a whole host of trouser ants tucking into their nethers. (You will have to find another reason if you see someone doing that in Cornwall though.)


Denzil Bark.