This weekend we celebrated my daughter’s wedding. It was a perfect weekend, and the celebration was an enormous success that lasted well into the night.

My daughter and her fiancé were eager to be married and begin their life together.  So eager that the groom said “I do” before it was time, muttering so only the first row could hear, “I do, I do, I do.” He waited for the officiant to finish so he could repeat his vows.

The bride and groom love each other deeply. Their love radiates. Their faces soften when they see each other. 

As I watched them, I realized how special love really is.

First, love is wildly contagious. As their love spilled out into the audience, we fell in love as well. I found myself saying “I love you” to friends and family throughout the night. I felt love for people I had just met. 

Love is a feeling that we can conjure. For example, pain is a memory, but we cannot recreate it (otherwise women would have just one child). But I can regenerate the feelings of love as if I am experiencing them all over again. Watching the couple say their vows, I was reminded of how I felt when my late husband and I shared our vows. 

Love is easy. When a room fills with love, feelings become easy to express, people are inclusive and easy going. 
Love is joy. Watching people having a good time on the dance floor made me experience their happiness.
Love is acceptance and celebrating differences. It didn’t matter if you were on the “bride’s side” or the “groom’s side.”
Love is appreciation. It is beyond acceptance. Love is liking people because of and in spite of their differences.
Love is kindness and sharing. 
Love is laughter. My family performed a choreographed dance for the bride and groom. Many of us are not very good dancers, and one of my sisters agreed to wear a disco helmet for the dance. We laughed so hard that we often missed our steps.
Love extends beyond the physical; my aches and pains temporarily subsided. 

That night made me think about a time nine years ago when my husband and I were driving to a hospital where doctors would surgically remove a metal scaffolding from his broken leg. Doctors couldn’t understand why his bone wasn’t healing or the source of his excruciating pain. After removing this metal device, they were able to diagnose a rare, advanced, and terminal cancer.

Doctors didn’t know that this would be our last journey together, but somehow, we did. On the long drive to the NYC hospital, I impulsively put in a CD that we hadn’t listened to in decades…it was the music that we fell in love with. He touched my arm and smiled, “I would have picked that, too.”

And instantly we were transported back to the time before life’s annoyances and pressing demands overshadowed love. Squeezing the toothpaste from the middle of the tube, late nights at work, career setbacks, parenting struggles…all of those melted away. We were back in love, for the last time. Every day we talked. He would ask me to remarry…still wanting to care for me after death. I promised him that I would take care of what remained. Even death cannot end love.

And I want to thank the bride and groom for reminding me of all of love’s superpowers, so powerful, it can even transcend death.

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

The blackbirds have left for the fields. So I have resumed filling my birdfeeders, which also double as a squirrel gymnasium. 

Over the years, I have tried a number of squirrel-proof feeders. Ones that spun, others that closed when a larger mammal stepped on the perch…all to no avail. Watching squirrels climb up a greased pole was amusing. They would take turns until one of them was able to absorb all of the oil and the remaining squirrels found a way to stick their claws into the metal. They overcame squirrel baffles by jumping from tree branches above, sticking their nails into them and leaning over to get the treats. 

The squirrels have thwarted all my attempts to stop them. At one point, I decided my birdfeeders were a training site for the squirrel Olympics (I am sure they must have one).

Often, I call on my trusty dogs to “go get the squirrels.” As soon as I speak, I hear screeching toenails skidding across the wooden floors, then the sound of excited barking, and the flap of the dog door as they race out to chase the squirrels. I do this because I know that they will not be able to actually catch the squirrels. Sadie, my toy poodle mix, weighs just a little more than the squirrels and the other two dogs are too slow and unfocused. They meander around the yard sniffing for squirrels. Only Sadie, the smart poodle mix, knows where to find the squirrels. By the time the other dogs make their way over, the squirrels have climbed up the trees and are taunting them with their chatter and tail whisking.

It’s a dance.

Over the years, I have alternately accepted the squirrels or tried to stop them. This fall, I am going to try again to thwart them again. 

I researched squirrel proof feeders to find one that I haven’t bought. I scrolled past the ones where the food holes were too small—the squirrels just chewed the plastic off. I ignored the motorized one where it spins around so fast that the squirrels fall off. While that was fun to watch for a while, eventually the squirrels saw this as an amusement park and were able to stay on for the ride. I ignore the birdfeeders where the perch is connected to the feeder and once a squirrel steps on it, it closes. The squirrels learned to attach themselves to the feeder without touching the perch. I settled for one that has heavy steel bands that encircle the feeder. While the squirrels can get on the birdfeeder, the metal bands between the holes shouldn’t allow them to reach the food. Let’s see how that works.

In the meantime, I have my trusty band of canines, at the ready.

I am a recovering worrier. I got it honestly, my Dad was a worrier. We worriers are a product of both nature and nurture.

First, the nature part of the equation. Research shows that the anxiety caused by worry has a genetic component. While they haven’t been able to isolate which genes play a role, they do know that people are more likely to inherit worrying and subsequent anxiety. If we have a close relative with this issue, our chances of being an anxious worrier are between 2 to 6 times higher than if we don’t. Scientists estimate that 30% of this trait is nature.

Nurture plays a key role, especially when it is learned in early childhood. If parents or close relatives are worriers, some children will learn that behavior. For example, if a mother is worried that each time she takes her child to daycare that something bad might happen, it raises the chance that the child may suffer anxieties at daycare. Often parents model anxious beliefs and behaviors without realizing it. They give the child the feeling that the world’s not safe and anything bad can happen to anyone at any time.

Anxious families also tend to overestimate the negative. If an anxious parent hears something scary or tragic on the news, it isn’t viewed as an outlier but rather a likelihood. Habitual worrying can train the mind to focus on the world as a scary place and increase the amount of worrying. 

Stress and sleep also play a role in worrying. The less sleep we get and the more stress we have, the more likely we are to worry.

Constant worry in the extreme is classified as Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD). People with GAD feel extremely worried or nervous. Their worry is out of proportion to the actual circumstance and is difficult to control. Both children and adults with GAD may experience physical symptoms as well, including chronic pain, fatigue, or shortness of breath.

It comes as no surprise that worrying is bad for our health. Chronic worrying can trigger a number of health problems because it causes the body’s sympathetic nervous system to release stress hormones such as cortisol. These hormones cause a broad and diverse set of physical reactions such as: difficulty swallowing, dizziness, dry mouth, racing heartbeat, fatigue, headache, poor concentration, irritability, chronic pain, nausea, nervous energy, rapid breathing, shortness of breath, excess sweating, and trembling. Even more significant is that it can result in serious long-term health consequences such as immune suppression, digestive disorders, short-term memory loss, and heart disease. Whew, that is a lot to worry about.

The good news is that there are methods to help us reduce worrying. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is commonly used to treat GAD and we can use their techniques to reduce worrying on our own. CBT teaches different ways of thinking, behaving, and reacting to situations that help worriers feel less anxious and worried. Another treatment option is acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT). ACT uses strategies such as mindfulness and goal setting. ACT is a newer form of treatment.

One treatment in CBT is simply to stop ourselves when we begin worrying. Recognize and tell our brains to stop, it can be as simple as that. 

CBT also teaches problem solving techniques to conquer worrying. The basic technique is to identify the problem, come up with solutions, evaluate the solutions, and select the best one. Then make a plan. 

Another approach is to ask ourselves realistically is this something that is truly a threat or simply a perceived threat. If it is a “real” threat, then follow the problem-solving steps listed above.

For example, I used to worry about the world that we were leaving our children and grandchildren. I recognized that I couldn’t solve global warming. But I could do my part (e.g., voting, driving an electric or hybrid car, reducing my use of plastics, buying recycled products, buying organic) to reduce my footprint on the world. My worrying about the environment was not going to help.

ACT and CBT recommend techniques such as: practicing mindfulness and gratitude, limiting exposure to stressors, relaxation, meditation, sharing these worries with close friends—to release them and have them debunked, distraction, having a supportive social network, and simply accepting what we cannot control. 

To calm the anxiety from worrying, a simple technique is deep breathing (mindfully and slowly breathe in and out to the count of 4). Another is a peaceful nature walk. 

A simple distraction exercise is the 333 rule. Look around and name three things that we see, three sounds we hear, and then move three parts of our body. 

Another technique is to write down what is worrying us. It makes it seem less daunting. 

An ACT technique is to refocus our mind toward good things. For example, count the number of things that we are grateful for this moment. Write down our moments of joy and refer to them. Moments of joy can be as simple as a cup of coffee or seeing a bluebird. Writing down moments of joy memorializes them and provides a good distraction.

The good news about worrying is that it is in our control. Once I started mindfully stopping my worrying, I found that I was a lot happier, a lot more relaxed, and my interaction with others was a lot more positive. When I worried about someone, I reflected those worries onto that person. It was stressful for the person that I was worrying about.

It is easy to see that worrying provides no value. And it is so obvious that even Mad Magazine could give advice on this one.

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

As I was walking on the nature trail, I watched two hummingbirds duking it out. One hummingbird was chasing another for encroaching on “his” flowers. It was a very large clump of flowers, plenty for both. Yet his territorial instincts kicked in and he chased away his fellow diner, only to discover that he had lost his place to another hummingbird. Hummingbirds even act territorial at hummingbird feeders.

There are few people who don’t love hummingbirds. The males sport bright jackets of colors and even the doughty females amuse us with their feats of flight as they dart and hover over the flowers and feeders.

Hummingbirds are unique. Their metabolism is so fast that they must eat every 10 minutes and consume 50 percent of their body weight each day. On a typical day, hummingbirds burn between 6,600 to 12,000 calories. Hummingbirds have the highest metabolic rate of any vertebrate animal. During flight and hovering, oxygen consumption is about 10 times higher than that of elite human athletes. Hummingbirds take approximately 150 breaths per minute! To conserve energy when food is scarce and at night, they enter a torpor state similar to hibernation, where they slow their metabolic rate to 1⁄15 of its normal rate.

Hummingbirds eat many small meals. Because their high metabolism makes them vulnerable to starvation, hummingbirds are highly attuned to food sources. They digest their food rapidly and spend 20% of their time feeding. Our local ruby-throated hummingbirds prefer red or orange flowers (though it’s not necessary to color the sugar water in a hummingbird feeder). 

Like many birds, hummingbirds have good color vision and can see the ultraviolet spectrum, which humans can’t see. Their eyesight acuity is better than ours as well.

Male ruby-throated hummingbirds don’t stick around after mating. This puts more stress on the female who must build the nest, incubate the eggs, and raise the chicks.

Ruby throated hummingbirds migrate to Mexico each year. They arrive in North America by late February and early March and return to Mexico and Central America in late November.

The lifespan of the ruby-throated hummingbird is short, from 3-5 years, with the highest death rates in yearlings. Scientists don’t know why, but their population has decreased by 17% in the 21st century. 

What is most amazing about hummingbirds is their flight. Hummingbirds have compact bodies with relatively long, bladelike wings. Their anatomical features allow them to fly like a helicopter in any direction, including hovering. The ruby-throated hummingbird beats its wings about 53 times a second. Yes, that’s right, in a second!

All of these amazing facts bring me to the essential question, why are these beautiful creatures so territorial? If they cooperated and shared their bounty it would require less energy than they currently expend chasing off other birds. I believe that it is because hummingbirds, with their intense bodily requirements, dwell in a world of scarcity. If they do not feed every 10 minutes, they cannot sustain themselves. Lack of food, not cold, is why they migrate. Because their needs are so extreme, they see each morsel of food in desperate terms. In their scarce world, another hummingbird is a threat to their existence.

On the other hand, many Americans live in a world of abundance; America is a rich country with many resources. Despite that, some perceive the world from a scarcity perspective and act accordingly. If we see the world from a scarcity viewpoint, then we are more likely to exhibit bad behaviors. If we see the world from an abundance point of view, we don’t need to be territorial, there is plenty for everyone.

Unlike hummingbirds, we get to choose.

 

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West, Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

There are few more relaxing sounds in the summer than the soft drumming of gentle rainfall, especially on the Eastern Shore. It means that our parched land is nourished—the crops, gardens, trees, and grass are revived. It signals that we can take a respite from watering. The soft, quiet plunks against the window are nature’s restoration. We depend on rain as much as the sun; without rain, our primary source of water would be gone.

So, I decided to learn more about this life affirming substance. First, what causes rain, and it is pretty simple. When a colder mass of air arrives and the amount of water in the air dips below the dewpoint, gravity will cause rain to fall. 

According to a simplified description in Wikipedia: Rain is water droplets that have condensed from atmospheric water vapor and then fall by gravity. The major cause of rain is moisture moving along zones of temperature and moisture contrasts (weather fronts). If enough moisture and upward motion is present, precipitation falls from clouds.

The amount of moisture in air is called relative humidity. The dewpoint is the temperature at which the air must be cooled in order to become saturated (produce condensation, including dew, rain, snow, hail, etc.). Dewpoint is used to measure comfort. A dewpoint above 60 feels humid, but it gets really uncomfortable when it is in the 70s. Meteorologists check dewpoints when making forecasts. For example, they might not forecast rain if the dewpoints are decreasing when dry air is moving into a region.

Another fun fact about rain is that it is not teardrop shaped. Instead, its shape is dependent on the size of the raindrops. Small raindrops are circular, but as raindrops get larger (and heavier) they take a shape similar to mushroom caps.

Science aside, one of the most important assets of rain is its healing properties. Besides the obvious of bringing us life affirming water, summer and spring rains can influence mood through both their sound and its smell. 

The relaxation that we feel from rain is called the petrichor effect, which occurs when the smell of rainfall triggers memories or relaxation. The smell of petrichor is created when raindrops hit our dry and clay soil, trapping air bubbles on the surface. These bubbles burst, releasing aerosols of scent into the air, which are then carried by the wind. The scent is most noticeable when light or moderate rainfalls. 

The sound of rain can also help us concentrate (like white noise), relax, and fall asleep. If you are someone who loves the rain its benefits are greater.

Rain is also healthy; it washes away pollutants and pollen, leaving behind less dust and allergens than the air during dry spells.

I am not alone in my appreciation of the rain; here are some quotes by writers who are just as enamored: 

“Let the rain kiss you. Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops. Let the rain sing you a lullaby.” – Langston Hughes

“Rain is grace; rain is the sky descending to the earth; without rain, there would be no life.” – John Updike

So, let’s hope for more gentle rain.

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

Sadie wrote a column some weeks ago, here is an update on how she is doing. To recap, Sadie is a 7-pound poodle mix that came from a puppy mill in Blairstown, NJ. The breeder retired and left the dogs to fend for themselves. A couple of rescue groups got involved and I adopted her from one of these groups.

When I adopted her, I knew she was not a normal dog. She was a puppy mill mom, who, despite her terrible life, kept her friendliness. Because Sadie came from a puppy mill, she lived in a crate in a barn without electricity. She never saw outside her crate, so she had no exposure to the outdoors, a home, or connection with a human. When it was time, she mated and produced puppies that went on to live wonderful lives, while she lived in squalor, barely fed, and when she got too dirty, she was hosed down no matter the weather. Her only contact with humans was when she was fed low-quality food (mostly boiled potatoes) and put in another crate to mate and raise her puppies.

But that was the past. Now Sadie is doing well adjusting to the life of a normal dog. She is no longer afraid of the outdoors, and loves chasing squirrels and bunnies. She is still afraid of the dark, which is surprising because she lived in a cage in a barn without electricity, but nevertheless, she refuses to venture out at night. Rain is another frightening prospect; she can’t figure out why she gets wet when she goes outside.

We are working on cause and effect. We haven’t made a lot of progress, yet; my other dog Annie, who had much worse treatment at her puppy mill never learned it; so it may be something that is imprinted at an early age. But we will keep trying. In the puppy mill, she learned that it didn’t matter what she did, she still got the same inhumane treatment.

Learning how to live in a house is coming along nicely. She is working very hard on her house training, but it is spotty (literally). Whenever it rains and wipes away the scent of her urine from the lawn, we have to start over. But it took me 6 years to train Annie, and Annie is now flawless, so I am hoping that Sadie will master it sooner, but with equally good results.

Sadie is eating well now, before she was finicky and slow. Now she gobbles up her food and loves her treats.

She is still very affectionate. She is leaning into the joys of a home…sleeping on furniture, sleeping with her mates and me on the bed (yes, it is a little crowded), and treats, lots of treats. She was able to keep her personality despite horrific circumstances and now she gets to live the life of a dog.

And she is still very brave.

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

I have an amazing old tree in my backyard, it is a gnarled, pitted, dying tree. Arborists dismissively describe my favorite tree as a messy, junk, boxelder tree. Its trunk tells its story, tree cankers surround it as a reminder of the storms that lashed through it, the viruses, bacteria, insects, and mold that tried to destroy it and the lichen that coats its dead branches. And while it probably started out as a junk tree, it is now a magnificent, intricate work of art. I will keep it as long as I can.

After reading Peter Wollenben’s bestseller, The Hidden Life of Trees, I developed a special admiration for trees. Richard Power’s Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Overstory expanded my appreciation.

Wollenben was the first to make the newest research about trees available to the general reader. Recent research has discovered that trees feed each other, especially their own kind, through the fungal mycorrhizal networks that are present underground throughout the earth. The fungi are connected to the trees’ roots, and they form a symbiotic relationship. The fungi supply the trees with carbon and mineral nutrients and the trees “pay” for this by giving them up to 30% of the sugar that they photosynthesize from sunlight. The fungi use what they need and transfer the rest to other trees through their network. 

This network connects to all trees in the forest. Research has shown that mature, healthy trees feed smaller trees, especially saplings who do not get enough sunlight to manufacture their own sugars. It also feeds trees that are not healthy. The small saplings that you see in a forest can be very old, some as old as 80 years, awaiting their time in the sun, which will occur when their parent dies. In the meantime, their trunks grow strong from the food supplied to them by their parent via the mycorrhizal network.

Trees communicate in a variety of ways. They communicate using pheromones or chemicals, warning other trees of pests, fungi, and other predators. Trees also communicate via a voltage signaling system through the mycorrhizal network at a 220 Hz signal that we cannot perceive. 

Trees have methods of responding to assaults. During an assault, trees produce a chemical that makes their leaves taste bitter to some invaders. A well-known example is the giraffe vs acacia tree. The wide-crowned umbrella thorn acacia is a favorite of giraffes. When a giraffe starts chewing acacia leaves, the tree notices the injury and emits a distress signal in the form of ethylene gas. Upon detecting this gas, neighboring acacias start pumping tannins into their leaves which can sicken or even kill giraffes. 

When elms and pines come under attack by leaf-eating caterpillars, they evaluate the caterpillar saliva, and release pheromones that notify neighboring trees of an attack. These pheromones also serve to attract parasitic wasps. The wasps lay their eggs inside the caterpillars, and the wasp larvae eat the caterpillars from the inside out.

Trees appear to be cooperative, by aiding trees that are sick, notifying other trees that are dangers, and even while dying releasing nutrients to neighboring trees.

The problem is that all of the research is on forests and not the trees that we have in our yards. Most scientists believe that this does not occur in trees that are planted in residential areas and trees planted after clear-cut logging.

But already, my box elder has beaten the odds, and I am hoping that scientists have yet to learn about our residential trees. I envision that healthy neighboring trees are feeding my old box elder through their own mycorrhizal network. I am hoping that this box elder will outlast me and provide the same wonderful focal point for the next homeowner.

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

I made the mistake of going to the grocery store early in the pandemic. Normally, the supermarket would have been pretty empty, and I would have gotten in and out very quickly. But not that night. The lines reached out to the aisles and what were people buying? Toilet paper, antibiotic wipes and water. 

Okay, I got the purchase of wipes. This was the only store in the area with them, so every cart had the maximum of four. (Some tried to cheat the system by getting four of each scent, seriously. The pandemic did not bring out the best in some of us.) 

It appears that the first thing to be negatively impacted by the outbreak was the environment. Starting with bottled water. That night, each shopping cart had cases of bottled water. It made sense in a weather event, but not in a pandemic. Ninety nine percent of the US population has access to running water. When I asked why they were purchasing water, they looked at me like I was crazy. 

This virus did not impact the use of toilet paper, yet every cart contained it. Why? For starters, American’s use 50% more toilet paper than any other country. While all the shopping carts contained toilet paper, water and wipes, few contained food. If I had been quarantined at home for a week or so, I would have needed food before I needed water or toilet paper (which has, to my knowledge, no nutritional value). 

Science did save us. In a remarkable circumstance, a new technology was used to create vaccines in months rather than years. Despite some serious hiccups, a life saving vaccine was available to all within less than a year. Dedicated doctors and scientists worked tirelessly to develop an effective treatment for an alien virus. Health care professionals risked their lives to care for the sick and became the true heroes of the disease. They put their lives on the line everyday to care for the sick. Other heroes, our teachers found a way to teach in the most difficult of circumstances. Our hero industries were those that kept our infrastructure intact. These companies continued to operate to ensure that we had enough food and supplies to survive during our isolation. The workers who had to be there and risked exposure, were there for us.

We learned that we could adapt to a contactless world. New words are in our lexicon, like Zoom. Young people whose important events (graduation, college, marriage) were eliminated by the pandemic, came up with creative ways to celebrate and study. 

Where possible, work and life became virtual. This is a trend that continues to this day. Many workers are virtual now for some days in their workweek. I attend a regular virtual meeting that used to be in person. I am able to socialize with close friends every week virtually playing a game that became popular during the pandemic.

On the negative side we learned that social media can be deadly. During the swine flu and polio epidemics, people lined up to get their vaccines for the good the community and their selves. But false information from social media created doubt and suspicion about the new vaccine. People sold false cures, bogus medications, and some followers subjected themselves to dangerous treatments instead of medically tested ones. 

The ugly side of some people came out, as they hoarded medications and paper products; so there wasn’t enough for the community.

But we have we have recovered, a testament to human resilience…yet, things are a little different. I still wear a mask in airports and places where there are large groups of people. I enjoy my virtual connections with friends and colleagues. 

But the one thing that I have learned is that in a pandemic, we may lose our common sense and our sense of security, but we will not give up our toilet paper.

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

A friend of mine recently discovered that she has a trace amount of Neanderthal DNA. It is estimated that 2% of Eurasians and 4% of East Asians have Neanderthal DNA. 

While Neanderthals became extinct, scientists now know that there was interbreeding between Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals. Some DNA from Neanderthals also includes Homo Sapien DNA, which suggests that interbreeding went both ways. 

There is another group of humanoids that interbred with Homo Sapiens, the Denisovans. Three to fifteen percent of Pacific Islanders, including the Philippines, have Denisovan DNA.

Around 300,000 years ago there were nine known Homo species in the continents of Africa, Europe, and Asia. Because of the interbreeding we know that Neanderthal and Denisovans overlapped with Homo Sapiens. Homo Sapiens began in Africa and eventually migrated to the European continent, but DNA tests of modern-day Africans show that a tiny percent have Neanderthal genes suggesting that it was not a one-way migration. 

Neanderthals are believed to have become extinct around 40,000 years ago. There was a 5,000-year period when Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals overlapped. Neanderthal remains have been found exclusively in Europe. Homo Sapien bones in Europe are dated approximately 47,000 years ago. 

Denisovans are only a recent discovery; they were discovered in 2010 in a cave in Russia. Based on butchered animal bones and stone tools used to remove animal hides, they were likely hunter-gatherers. They lasted later than the Neanderthals (approximately 35,000 years ago), which could explain their higher percentages. 

So, do scientists know how and why Homo Sapiens won the game of life? 

Of course, they cannot know, but they have some theories. First, there were not many Neanderthals. (Only a few small bone fragments of Denisovans have been found, so little is known about that species.) One theory is that Homo Sapiens had bigger brains and used more tools than Neanderthals. Neanderthal communities were smaller than Homo sapiens communities, and scientists suspect that there was inbreeding within their group. Due to this inbreeding, Neanderthals may have been more susceptible to disease and other pathogens. The fact that Homo Sapiens would have collaborated more and lived in larger groups is another possible reason for their survival. 

Another theory is that the Neanderthals may have been wiped out by the Ice Age, and Homo Sapiens, despite coming from Africa, were somehow more adaptable to climate change. With the Ice Age came more competition for scarce resources. Thus, wars and violence over these limited resources is also a possibility. Finally, some scientists believe that perhaps a lot of interbreeding with Homo Sapiens may have effectively replaced Neanderthals with Homo Sapiens. It is likely to be a combination of all of these factors.

So, the bottom line is that somehow our species survived while others didn’t. But they didn’t completely go away, they are in DNA. And this ancient DNA may hold some secrets; already scientists have discovered that Denisovan DNA has genes that enable people to be successful in high altitudes. Given how difficult life was back then, it is perhaps a good thing to have this ancient DNA.

Homo Sapiens won in a “survival of the fittest” scenario. However, given our current political climate, I am now wondering about if the fittest did survive.

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.

I am feeling a general malaise from this hot, humid drought. To add insult to injury, for the past month I have been on the losing end of a relentless ant campaign.

In the past, ants were invasive when the water table was high, but this drought defies that explanation. It is almost as if they can’t stand the weather either and are looking for air conditioning and other creature comforts that my house offers.

So, I proceeded to learn more about why these critters are so invasive this year. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a lot of specific information, but I did gain an appreciation for these little creatures. 

According to experts, the possible explanations for ant invasions this year are:

• Extended periods of dry weather are affecting the ants’ food supply causing them to go beyond their natural food source into new areas (such as my home). These ants leave a chemical trail so that they can find their way back and other ants can follow them into my home. 
• Ant colonies are usually in and around homes so that they can have better access to our food and water.
• Our climate-controlled homes offer ideal environments for ants to flourish. There is plenty of condensation and crumbs. Tiny crevices throughout our homes make it easy for them to enter.
• Ants reproduce at such a high rate that there are both sufficient worker ants to venture out and more of them to feed.

And there are a lot of ants. It is estimated that there are 2.5 million ants for every human on the planet, and the numbers keep increasing. So, it is no wonder that they are invading our homes.

While the ants in my house are pavement ants and could conceivably spread germs (from their little feet); they are more of a nuisance than a pest. 

The secret behind the ants’ success is that they live and work together in highly organized colonies. In fact, most ant colonies are so united toward the common purposes of survival, growth, and reproduction that they behave like a single organism. 

Everyone in the colony has a role. A single queen lays the eggs, and the male fertilizes them. All other ants are female worker ants.  

An ant colony is like a factory. Nestmates work together to build their colonies. The worker ants perform all duties. Younger ants work inside the nest, taking care of the queen. They also work in the “nursery” tending to the eggs and feeding the larvae. Older workers are the ones that we see, they venture outside to gather food. The older workers are also responsible for defending the nest against enemies (more about that later). The queen doesn’t boss the workers around. It is an egalitarian society rather than an autocratic one. The workers decide amongst themselves which tasks to perform based on age, personal preferences, interactions with nestmates, and cues from the environment.

Members of an ant colony communicate with each other using chemicals, called pheromones, which they sniff with their antennae. In addition, ants can use touch and vibration to communicate. Worker ants release pheromones with specific messages, such as “Follow me to Angela’s house!” or “Attack the intruder!”. Nestmates also use pheromones to recognize each other. 

Each individual ant has a tiny brain. But all the ants of a colony combined are pretty smart. Ant superorganisms can solve difficult problems by processing information as a group. For example, a colony will compare potential nest sites before collectively choosing the best one.

Ants are both hunter/gatherers and farmers. Besides gathering the crumbs from our tables, they also hunt insects, eggs, and even larger vertebrates for food. They attack in large numbers. Leaf cutters are farmers that bring leaves back to the colony, where they use them to grow a fungus for their food. Some ants “farm” aphids, protecting aphids, keeping them contained and eating their excrement (which is a sweet nectar).

Ants serve as medics as well, tending to the sick, but once an ant has been contaminated, it will be removed from the colony and killed. Any defective eggs or larvae will also be killed. The colony is more important than the individual.

Ants are very loyal to their colony, but not to outsiders. Competition among colonies for food and other resources can lead to war. Workers sometimes sting, spray, and bite to death during these battles. 

But there is not enough ant war to prevent infestations in my house, at least. So to avoid ants, experts recommend that we regularly clean up kitchen spills, store food in airtight containers, and keep fruits in the fridge.

If it gets too bad, it is recommended that you use a professional.

But, if you want to try getting rid of ants on your own, use ant bait traps where they are entering your home. But there are drawbacks. First, bait traps produce a scent that attracts ants. Second, dying ants release pheromones that alert nearby ants to come to their aid. 

As I am writing this, a fly has been buzzing me for the past hour, be assured that I am NOT going to be writing about how cool flies are in my next column.

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Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.