Free Predators I Have Known by Alan Dean Foster Page A

you—perhaps a jaguar, lord of the rain forest? I walked faster.
    The single pit toilet that had been dug to service the workers had necessarily been sited a good distance away from the lake and the camp. The smell of it was unavoidable, but oddly not overpowering. There was no roof over the small clearing, no walls surrounding it. A single rough bench seat was all that held the visitor safely clear of the suppurating ooze that lay below. Sitting there in the middle of the Amazonian night, nervously trying to dissect every crackle and peep and hoot while urging my convulsing digestive system to hurry and finish its work, I was not worried about what might be moving silently through the dark forest around me, or waiting to drop down from the tangle of branches above. All I could think of, all I could try not to imagine, was what might be lurking and slithering and slipping through the accumulated organic morass beneath my partially naked, vulnerable body. I would far rather face an angry armed man.
    Ever since that night, in whatever corner of the planet I happen to find myself, I always make it a point before the sun sets to pay a visit to whatever sanitary facility is available—no matter how crude or seemingly unhygienic it may appear to be.
    Another couple of days were to pass before I was to make the all-too intimate acquaintance of a singular ant.
    Having found a little time to slip away from supervising construction of the lodge, Boris was guiding Mark and me on one of our longer hikes through the rain forest. As we walked, he enthusiastically pointed out colorful insects, named trees and bushes, and struggled to identify birds according to their songs and calls, careful always to give their scientific as well as common names. It was another steamy late afternoon. Tomorrow would also be hot and steamy, as would the day after that, and the day following. Unless it rained hard, in which case it would only be warm and damp for a while. Once the rain stopped, it would inevitably turn hotter and steamier than ever.
    Quite unexpectedly, we came to a clearing in the forest.
    It was immediately apparent that this was no inadvertent open space. A single tree stood in the middle of a parklike circle some twenty feet in diameter. The tree itself was not particularly impressive. The clearing that surrounded it was. The site looked as if it had just been mowed by some especially devoted golf course groundskeeper tending to a particularly loved piece of turf. Despite being surrounded on all sides by a rich, loamy, decaying mat of sodden and nourishing rain-forest detritus, not so much as a single green shoot poked its hopeful head skyward from the cleared area.
    “ Palo santo .” Boris pointed at the tree that was thriving in the center of the inexplicable circle. “The ants that live in the tree keep the area around it perfectly clear. Within the boundaries, nothing is allowed to live that might take nutrients or water from the tree or otherwise harm it. If something starts to grow, they cut it down. If it moves, they kill it or drive it away. In return, the tree gives the ants a home.”
    I had long read of such symbiotic ant-tree relationships. The fire ants that dwelled within the tangarana tree are called by the same name as their home: tangarana ants. They were not as widely known and did not have the same widespread malevolent cache as army ants or the dreaded isula ants, but they were feared nonetheless.
    “Come, I’ll show you.” Boris started toward the solitary bole. Mark and I exchanged a glance and followed.
    Up close, we studied the foot-thick tree trunk. There wasn’t an ant in sight. Unsheathing his machete, Boris reversed it and using the solid haft began tapping lightly on the wood. Within seconds, the trunk was swarming with hundreds of ants. Observing them, I relaxed a little. Despite the frenetic activity they displayed as they searched for the source of the disturbance, they were no more than a quarter