RE: About those Piranha Bugs - LOOOOONG

G'day,

> I noticed that it was stated that there were numerous mounds 
> of these bugs within proximity to one another,  
> While the bugs themselves are quite 
> believable, I have a problem with this....

This assumes that the nests you see on the surface aren't just
expressions
of one meta-nest. We may see them as separate colonies, but they may be
linked underground or be projections of a main nest and so be all
friendly
together - think of the columns of Army ants and their offshoots when
they
hit obstacles, each offshoot will look separate, but self recognition
allows
them to join the main column again seamlessly when they meet up again.
So
you could get away the density shown as the colonists may well perceive
them
as separate colonies, but that doesn't mean the bug does ;)

> The more a predator eats, and the more often it 
> has to eat, the larger the territory it tends to 
> try to defend.  

Sort of. It has to supply itself yes, so their territories will be quite
large if there are many links in the chain before them as 90% of the
energy
in any one level is lost, with 10% only making it to their predator to
support them.

> This means that either the country 
> around them is carpeted in prey animals, or they must 
> maintain a fairly large territory.  

Or supplement with other behaviour, such as scavenging or farming. May
well
be that different cast members have different dietary requirements too -
so
the "strippers" are the "soldiers" who follow the credo of the best
defence
is offence, whereas the bulk of the colony is based on eating farmed
fungi
or wood boring or grazing of vegetation, heck they could even have
symbionts
that allow them to be photo or chemosynthetic. Once again the colonists
may
not have noticed minor details like that if its hard to do research on
them
in the first place - all termites from afar can look alike (specks), but
up
close there can be major differences - thus the many millions seen on
the
nests may not all be "strippers".

Alternatively the mounds may only be temporarily inhabited, the Piranha
Bugs
may stay permanently on the move like Army Ants which do number in the
millions and can strip a horse. So the Piranha Bugs may move from mound
complex to mound complex as they strip whatever is in their path.

Yet another alternative is that the Piranha Bugs are actually just one
stage
in the life cycle (so sort of the same argument as above, but a life
stage
not a caste), and once they've "eaten their full" so to speak they
reproduce
and die. Thus relieving pressure on the local surrounds until that life
stage is reached again.

Yet another alternative is that the ants take the opportunity of the
food
presenting itself to do a raid and save them the effort of going to get
it -
much the same way as Army ants will forgoe their dawn raid if a large
food
source presents itself at the door of their bivouac.

OK better stop now before I go through too many alternatives and make
you
want to release said bugs on me ;)

Beth