You’ve seen ants outside, busy carrying food into their ant mounds. Did you know you can have ants as a pet? Ant farms are even more interesting than outside ants, because you can see them working down inside their tunnels.
Task:
You’re going to learn about ants in order to see if an ant farm would be a good classroom pet. You’ll need to find out some information about ants first. You may discover other questions you’ll want to answer, too.
Process:
- How do you make an ant farm?
- Where do you get the ants from?
- What do ants eat?
- What can we do with ants besides just watch them?
- Learn about ants from observing the classroom ant farms
- Write about your observation in the classroom Daily Science Journal.
- Discover information about ants’ habitats, food, and more facts
- Use books, videos and web sites to help you in your research.
- Would an ant farm would make a good classroom pet? With your group members, write down the pros and cons to having an ant farm as a classroom pet.
- Draw a picture of an ant and label the parts of its body.
Evaluation:
Did you draw and label your picture of ants correctly? What did you find out about what ants eat? How did you decide if the ants had an appropriate habitat to live in? Did you have enough supportive reasons (pros) to decide if ants would be good classroom pet? Habitat
Ants live in large groups known as colonies. Ants can be found all over the world. Some ants live in nests on the ground, other ants live on trees. To keep ants as pets, you need to imitate their habitat as much as possible. You don’t want them to get loose in the classroom. Ant farms can be ordered or made.
Ant Food
Ants eat many different things. Ants eat wasps, insects, dead birds or mice, green flies, or other sugar giving animals.
Ants are important to help keep the balance of nature. Ants help keep the world free of pest infestation. Ants are often called The Health Police of the forest.
Cool Facts about Ants
WEB LINKS
- Ants have been in existence for 100 million years.
- There are 8,800 known species of ants in the world.
- Ants live in nests that range in size from very large to tiny nests such as that of Lepthothorax Tuberointeruptus that occupies a space equivalent to 2 pennies held apart by a few grains of sand.
- Ants make up as much as 10% of the total animal biomass in the world.
Insect Lore (ant farm ordering) The Raiders: Army Ants Insect World: About Ants About Ants Ant Colonies Leaf Cutter Ant Habitats
Last updated on 08/02/06
