15 replies to this topic

[gcsnelling]

Time for a gentle reminder about the upcoming Ants of the Southwest class.

 

http://www.amnh.org/...f-the-southwest

 

[Miles]

Highly recommended!

[dspdrew]

I'd love to go some day.

[ctantkeeper]

how much will it cost?

[gcsnelling]

I am not sure of the cost off hand, information can be found at the link or associated links.

[MrILoveTheAnts]

Says it's $1300 not including travel and maybe ~150 worth of stuff they recommend you buy for the course. I went a few years ago and found it to be a wonderful vacation. You're surrounded by experts, grad students, and hobbyists who are all ant crazy. And the station is full of people who are all there either studying or observing various aspects of nature. Also you're in the most ant rich part of the country. At the station you're really not roughing it at all. I'd say bring your own bottled water supply with you. Besides that the dorms are spacious, the food was great, you're given three meals everyday. Ray Mendez lives down the street. I can not recommend this place enough.

Edited by MrILoveTheAnts, February 27 2016 - 1:54 PM.

[gcsnelling]

We enjoyed having you there.

[NightsWebs]

Sounds like its quite an experience.  I read the course only accepts 15 people.  I am not sure what my chances would be of getting accepted since I have no formal education in entomology or biology.

[MrILoveTheAnts]

Sounds like its quite an experience.  I read the course only accepts 15 people.  I am not sure what my chances would be of getting accepted since I have no formal education in entomology or biology.

 

Neither did I, neither did Miles. And I'd say some of the grad students there weren't particularly interested in ants, some of them seemed to just be looking to get out into the world. That's not to say they won't go on to do great things in science, but Miles and I were certainly better about identifying ants to genus level at a glance than most of the other students. Though I recall glancing at a microscope slide and saying "Oh that's a Hypoponera" then when one asked me "how do you know that?" I was at a loss for words to really say. I just kind of knew without knowing the process to key them out.

 

A curve ball that really threw Miles and Me was when we thought we found Acropyga... turns out they were Crematogaster smithi, though in our defense we had no idea anything that small was in that genus! They're smaller than some of the Temnothorax I've found!

Another fun thing was finding Crematogaster species that nested underground. All the ones that occur where I live are exclusive wood nesters or opportunistic.

Edited by MrILoveTheAnts, February 27 2016 - 8:46 PM.

[dspdrew]

Wow I didn't know Crematogaster got that small. We have a few species that nest in the ground here. As a matter of fact, the one decent little colony I have is ground-nesting.

[Mdrogun]

 

Sounds like its quite an experience.  I read the course only accepts 15 people.  I am not sure what my chances would be of getting accepted since I have no formal education in entomology or biology.

 

. Though I recall glancing at a microscope slide and saying "Oh that's a Hypoponera" then when one asked me "how do you know that?" I was at a loss for words to really say. I just kind of knew without knowing the process to key them out.

 

I know what you mean. I don't know how I can tell the genus, I just kind of can. Someone had asked me on an identification thread how I knew the genus and I didn't really know how to answer. Maybe after watching every single video and picture I can find even if they are really old (I loved your Ant Chat series) you just learn the body types of queens and become really good at identifying them.

[MrILoveTheAnts]

 

 

Sounds like its quite an experience.  I read the course only accepts 15 people.  I am not sure what my chances would be of getting accepted since I have no formal education in entomology or biology.

 

. Though I recall glancing at a microscope slide and saying "Oh that's a Hypoponera" then when one asked me "how do you know that?" I was at a loss for words to really say. I just kind of knew without knowing the process to key them out.

 

I know what you mean. I don't know how I can tell the genus, I just kind of can. Someone had asked me on an identification thread how I knew the genus and I didn't really know how to answer. Maybe after watching every single video and picture I can find even if they are really old (I loved your Ant Chat series) you just learn the body types of queens and become really good at identifying them.

 

 

The experts have the same issue, they can ID things at a glance, but one thing they said is you really have to watch that. Visit another continent and suddenly you have a whole different array of ants that behave and at a glance look exactly like our native species. I think one said for every species in the Arizona deserts, there's a counterpart for in the deserts of Australia. So knowing how to key stuff out is great, but then you fall into this problem at the other end of the spectrum. "Ants of North America" is a great guide (though I'm not sure they've accounted for recent changes in taxa yet,) but I feel someone should know that they're looking at an Army Ant, Neivamyrmex, before having to examine the number of tarsal claws. 

 

Now back to the issue at hand. I'd highly recommend applying. Even if you get a rejection letter you can always say on the following year that you applied the previous year. When Miles and I went, there were only 7 students, (4 grads and 3 hobbyists) with 3 professors, one of whom also brought their son along. 

 

Ant Course, not to be confused with Ants of the Southwest which is what we're talking about here, does 30 students consistently every year. I'm not 100% sure why this is, but in my rejection letter last year they said 75 had applied and for hobbyists there's a ~4 year waiting list. Now, next year, rumor has it, that Ant Course will be on hiatus! I don't know why, but I'm willing to bet, if the rumor is true, that Ants of the Southwest will get a lot more applications from grad students!

 

So if you're able to apply to Ants of the Southwest this year, I would certainly do so before the flood of ant course hungry grad students fill the course!

[gcsnelling]

Had not heard about AC taking a hiatus but I would not be shocked, if true it could indeed mean influx of applications to AOTSW. I have noticed that folks do manage to confuse the two classes not sure why since they are quite distinctly different beasts. I guess the words "ant" in the course name confuses all those grad students.

[gcsnelling]

Reminder time...

Edited by gcsnelling, April 23 2016 - 6:59 PM.

[dspdrew]

I need to go to this one of these days.

[Gregory2455]

Maybe one day...