These are some neat findings! For a while now I've wondered if ants can get "bored" like humans do. Like do repletes in Myrmecocystus species get bored being a living refrigerator? I remember that I once read that ants which leave the nest to forage are found have higher levels of dopamine than ants that tend to the brood, so maybe being active and useful to the colony is appealing to workers. It would make a lot of sense considering that pretty much every other social species seems to be happiest when they are being useful to their group (like how dogs really like having jobs).
However, I'm not entirely convinced that we can call this "enrichment" or "entertainment" for the ants. Enrichment sort of implies some form of playing or enjoying themselves, whereas in this case, it's more about busying themselves. Even so, I wouldn't be surprised if this is beneficial to the ants—I'd expect that displaying any sort of activity or enthusiasm is a sign of a healthy colony.
Another question that this makes me wonder is if it could be "enriching" (for lack of a better word, as I'm still not sure if that term works in this context) for ants to hunt live insects. A lot of what ants eat in the wild will be scavenged, but, especially for some species, they hunt a lot too. Its actually a point I don't see brought up a lot when talking about feeding pre-killed insects. I've considred giving my ants live fruit flies so that they can hunt, but I'm not sure if there would actually be any benefit or if they would prefer it at all. I'd love to hear some other people's opinions on it though!
I think of it from the POV of, fulfilling your programing directives is enriching/entertaining for you(life/us). The "this feels good/bad" is the chemical feedback loop to get you to repeat what you are doing, or change up what you are doing.
I'd suggest the existence of a replete, from the replete's POV, would not experience negative chemical feedback loops(emotions/feelings) of boredom, doing exactly what it's life program tells it to be doing. It would instead experience whatever chemicals relate to fulfillment/enjoyment/got that good, i'm doing it right feel for whatever it is you're doing.
This is why i perceive that all such captivity situations, where the captor attempts to help the captive fulfill their natural chemical directives, may be considered enrichment/entertainment for them.
Remember the wolf pups play because it feels fun to them.
It feels fun, not so they can feel the fun, but so they will practice the skills that they will very much need to survive later on.
The curiosity is a feeling to make you go investigate a potential new food source.
While simultaneously the fear of the unknown keeps you cautious and not complacent in a potentially dangerous moment.
And many creatures will get a hit of the dopamine, from a successful reaction to the fight or flight feeling. Generally speaking it will feel good to succeed, at whatever the chemicals directed.
I would imagine that makes for a decent incentive to face the dangers outside the nest for foragers. And brood care being a more relaxed/lower stress effort, simply did not need as strong a chemical motivator to repeat the behavior.
And yes i do believe that Ants (and all creatures) programed to hunt live prey, do miss out on a substantial amount of their own life's fulfillment chemicals, not being able to fulfill that programing directive.
If I kept trap jaws or other such hunting ants i would for sure feel compelled to feed them live prey. Which is part of why i picked harvesters. I'm pretty lazy, and as has been pointed out by ANTdrew, live insect feeding is a significant infection vector for a captive colony.
Being lazy i wanted to keep my risk efforts minimal. So for scavenger ants, all insects can be boiled to help reduce such infection chances, without leaving them unable to fulfill their chemical directives to hunt.
So this is why i call it this, all life running on the same/similar chemicals may be assumed to share in similar experiences from them. If it enriches the bear to play with a ball, how does it not the ant?
And as you note, we also seem to lack a better term anyway.
Edited by Full_Frontal_Yeti, October 31 2023 - 12:16 PM.
