full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Walter R. Tschinkel: Mating frenzies, sperm hoards, and brood raids the life of a fire ant queen

Unscramble the Blue Letters


Her daughters will have to work quickly though— returning their mother to good hatelh is urgent. In the surrounding area, dozens of nierhnoibgg qnuees are building their own ant armies. These colonies have peellfcauy ctexoesid so far, but once workers appear, a phenomenon known as brood-raiding benigs. Workers from nests up to several meters away begin to steal offspring from our queen. Our colony retaliates, but new waves of raiders from even further away overwhelm the workers. Within horus, the rierdas have taken our queen’s entire brood supply to the largest nearby nest— and the queen’s surviving daughters abandon her. Chasing her last chance of survival, the queen follows the raiding trail to the winning nest. She fends off other losing queens and the defending nest’s workers, fighting her way to the top of the brood pile. Her daughters help their mother succeed where other queens fail— defeating the rngeiing monarch, and usurping the brood pile. eavtunlley, all the rameinnig challengers fail, until only one queen— and one boord pile— remains.

Open Cloze


Her daughters will have to work quickly though— returning their mother to good ______ is urgent. In the surrounding area, dozens of ___________ ______ are building their own ant armies. These colonies have __________ _________ so far, but once workers appear, a phenomenon known as brood-raiding ______. Workers from nests up to several meters away begin to steal offspring from our queen. Our colony retaliates, but new waves of raiders from even further away overwhelm the workers. Within _____, the _______ have taken our queen’s entire brood supply to the largest nearby nest— and the queen’s surviving daughters abandon her. Chasing her last chance of survival, the queen follows the raiding trail to the winning nest. She fends off other losing queens and the defending nest’s workers, fighting her way to the top of the brood pile. Her daughters help their mother succeed where other queens fail— defeating the ________ monarch, and usurping the brood pile. __________, all the _________ challengers fail, until only one queen— and one _____ pile— remains.

Solution


  1. coexisted
  2. queens
  3. hours
  4. remaining
  5. health
  6. neighboring
  7. eventually
  8. peacefully
  9. brood
  10. reigning
  11. begins
  12. raiders

Original Text


Her daughters will have to work quickly though— returning their mother to good health is urgent. In the surrounding area, dozens of neighboring queens are building their own ant armies. These colonies have peacefully coexisted so far, but once workers appear, a phenomenon known as brood-raiding begins. Workers from nests up to several meters away begin to steal offspring from our queen. Our colony retaliates, but new waves of raiders from even further away overwhelm the workers. Within hours, the raiders have taken our queen’s entire brood supply to the largest nearby nest— and the queen’s surviving daughters abandon her. Chasing her last chance of survival, the queen follows the raiding trail to the winning nest. She fends off other losing queens and the defending nest’s workers, fighting her way to the top of the brood pile. Her daughters help their mother succeed where other queens fail— defeating the reigning monarch, and usurping the brood pile. Eventually, all the remaining challengers fail, until only one queen— and one brood pile— remains.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
queen begins 2
brood pile 2


Important Words


  1. abandon
  2. ant
  3. area
  4. armies
  5. begins
  6. brood
  7. building
  8. challengers
  9. chance
  10. chasing
  11. coexisted
  12. colonies
  13. colony
  14. daughters
  15. defeating
  16. defending
  17. dozens
  18. entire
  19. eventually
  20. fail
  21. fends
  22. fighting
  23. good
  24. health
  25. hours
  26. largest
  27. losing
  28. meters
  29. monarch
  30. mother
  31. nearby
  32. neighboring
  33. nest
  34. nests
  35. offspring
  36. overwhelm
  37. peacefully
  38. phenomenon
  39. pile
  40. queen
  41. queens
  42. quickly
  43. raiders
  44. raiding
  45. reigning
  46. remaining
  47. remains
  48. retaliates
  49. returning
  50. steal
  51. succeed
  52. supply
  53. surrounding
  54. survival
  55. surviving
  56. top
  57. trail
  58. urgent
  59. usurping
  60. waves
  61. winning
  62. work
  63. workers