biomass nor worker number pairings gave red imported fire ants a numerical advantage
over crazy ants, as crazy ants are much smaller than fire ants, which may explain why fire
ants performed more poorly than crazy ants in both colony unit types. Nevertheless, the
results of the laboratory study, including the finding that standardizing factor was
insignificant, suggest that if a crazy ant population is similar in number to a neighboring
fire ant population, the crazy ants may be able to outcompete fire ants for resources, even
if the fire ants have a greater population biomass than the crazy ants.
The laboratory findings on recruitment times mirror the results of the field
experiment, as crazy ants discovered both bait types more quickly than fire ants in the
field (Figure 3.8). In contrast to the laboratory findings, crazy ant recruitment to both
bait types was much lower than fire ant recruitment (Figure 3.7), and this may be due to
the large difference in field abundance between the species. Relatively small colonies of
crazy ants were introduced to an area dominated by fire ants nests, which likely each
have thousands of workers (Markin et al. 1973). The difference in recruitment
abundance appears to be more important than recruitment time in determining control of
baits, as fire ants controlled significantly more protein baits (which received the highest
recruitment by both species) at the end of 1 hour. Also, in the field, ants of both species
recruited to protein in higher numbers, though no preference for protein was shown in the
laboratory experiment (Figure 3.7). This may be because laboratory colonies were fed a
diet that included generous amounts of protein until 24 hours before the start of the
experiment, whereas field colonies were likely protein-limited, as ants are often more
abundant than prey items (Tobin 1991,1994). Also, laboratory colonies had negligible
brood, whereas field colonies presumably had brood, which have a greater need for
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