No fear
One of the scariest plagues that I read about when I was young was the plague of insects. Locusts will devour every vegetation in their flight path. Army ants will devour all animals in their path. Every time I saw a grasshopper, I wondered if it was a locust in disguise. When I saw a column of ants in the wild, I wondered if they were part of a bigger army.
Locusts are actually grasshoppers babies that spawn under certain conditions. These grasshopper "mutants" swarm, devour vegetation and breed at an incredible rate. Although the locusts do fly, they are able to travel vast distances due to the assistance of the wind. The wind is an effect of air in high-pressure areas moving to the areas of low pressure. Once the swarm of locusts are in a low pressure are, they are trapped. Their original flight path will be devoted of vegetation. Flying against the wind is also quite exhausting. Once the food supply runs out, the locust swarm will stop moving. Locusts plagues can be destructive even after they are dead. This results in pests devouring the locusts carcass. Besides chemical warfare in the form of pesticides, modern man also uses biological "weapons" against the locusts.
Locusts devour vegetation but army ants are supposed to be able to drive out all animals in an area. These are ants that are nomadic. When I was young, I saw moving as a very simple process. The ants just needed to walk from one place to another. Most social creatures cannot live on a simple "Ayn Rand" concept. They have to move their eggs/grubs and food supply from one area to the next. They will also have to build a nest for the queen, the juvenile ants and eggs in the new area. The army ants only "pillage" when they are in a new area. Even then, most people have enough warning to move themselves and their livestock away from the ants' migration path. To date, we have not seen the ants (an unstoppable force) attack a city (an immovable object) so I can only assume that the army ants do not see any benefits of colonising the cities.
Locusts are actually grasshoppers babies that spawn under certain conditions. These grasshopper "mutants" swarm, devour vegetation and breed at an incredible rate. Although the locusts do fly, they are able to travel vast distances due to the assistance of the wind. The wind is an effect of air in high-pressure areas moving to the areas of low pressure. Once the swarm of locusts are in a low pressure are, they are trapped. Their original flight path will be devoted of vegetation. Flying against the wind is also quite exhausting. Once the food supply runs out, the locust swarm will stop moving. Locusts plagues can be destructive even after they are dead. This results in pests devouring the locusts carcass. Besides chemical warfare in the form of pesticides, modern man also uses biological "weapons" against the locusts.
Locusts devour vegetation but army ants are supposed to be able to drive out all animals in an area. These are ants that are nomadic. When I was young, I saw moving as a very simple process. The ants just needed to walk from one place to another. Most social creatures cannot live on a simple "Ayn Rand" concept. They have to move their eggs/grubs and food supply from one area to the next. They will also have to build a nest for the queen, the juvenile ants and eggs in the new area. The army ants only "pillage" when they are in a new area. Even then, most people have enough warning to move themselves and their livestock away from the ants' migration path. To date, we have not seen the ants (an unstoppable force) attack a city (an immovable object) so I can only assume that the army ants do not see any benefits of colonising the cities.
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