The death spiral is a mysterious phenomenon of ants, for no reason running in a circle
Ant circles (ants, death spi, carousel of death) – a natural phenomenon, consisting in the fact that one or a small group of ants begins to run around the closed circle for no apparent reason, gradually involving more and more other ants into its endless cycle. Ants continue their run until they fall dead, and the ant circle continues its rotation until the ants are completely exhausted, leaving the hordes of the dead.
The largest American Mirmeecologist William Morton Wieler described in 1910 in the laboratory case the case of a spontaneously arising ant circle, which was operating for 46 hours. In 1921, the American traveler William Bib in his book “The Land of the Jungle” described the circle of ants with a diameter of about 365 meters he saw in Gayan, in which each of the ants made a full cycle in 2.5 hours. This anthill existed for 2 days, dotting the soil under him with dead bodies, while a small group of workers anti -workers accidentally separated from the general movement and led the survivors.
There are various explanations of the phenomenon of “ant circles” associated with the pheromone trace by which ants run, the influence of the magnetic field, etc.