When the trees where these ants live were damaged, they made some DIY repairs.
He and his brother, Lucas, and three other local teens decided to do an experiment, with guidance from their father, William Wcislo, a scientist with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. They began drilling holes into other Cecropia trees in their Panama City neighborhood.
"These results of home-repair behavior … in a symbiont reveal a new level of attention by the ants to their host plants," the researchers wrote."The ants not only behave in ways to minimize damage to their hosts, but when damage does occur, they actively work to fix it, albeit for their own benefit."
The researchers reasoned that perhaps the ants learned to patch the plants because the toenails of sloths and silky anteaters may pierce the trees – and those holes needed repair.
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