I haven’t been writing anything wonderfully sciencey in a while, due to exams and life and everything else. So here is a quick snippet about one of my favourite random science facts!
Did you know that Grass ants cannot digest grass?
The ants are most commonly seen carrying grass cuttings from your lawn to their homes, deep cavernous tunnels full of thousands of ants. It is a general assumption that they eat said cuttings, however the cellulose in the cell walls of grass cells is indigestible by ants and humans alike. This is because it is insoluble in water so cannot be broken down in the stomach. However, grass ants display an unusual mutualistic relationship between ant and fungi. Fungus-growing ants actively propagate, nurture and defend the basidiomycete cultivar. In return the fungi provide the ants with nutrients, as the fungus can break down the cellulose that the ants cannot.
Now this is an incredibly random bit of information, one my biology teacher passed on in our first A-level lesson, it has stuck with me, and has joined the list of facts I know that are too random to ever be needed even at a pub quiz. Other facts on that list include that hummingbirds lay tic-tak shaped eggs and that cannibals reportedly prefer human eyes to other organs when eating.
Catherine's Science Blog 