Have you ever seen one of these 2-inch ants before? I never had until a month ago when I noticed on one our driveway. It ran away before I had a chance to show it to Daniel. And then last weekend we found one on our back porch while eating breakfast. I steered Sophie away from it {she can be too curious for her own good sometimes} while Daniel killed it {or attempted to}.
Once the ant was immobile, Daniel looked it up on the internet and we discovered that it was called a Red Velvet Ant. Also commonly known as a Cow Killer because it inflicts a sting that is so painful that it would in theory kill a cow {they don't really kill cows}. Thankfully they are not supposed to be hostile and will run away from people.
It turned out that the ant was not quite dead and was making attempts to come back to life while Daniel researched it – it's a tough little sucker. The good news is that these Red Velvet Ants {actually a part of the wasp family} prey on Yellow Jackets – which we have a lot of. So I will keep a respectful distance the next time I see one and be thankful that it will hunt down the Yellow Jacket nests and destroy them.
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