LORD OF THE ANTS

On Tuesdays my boys and husband watch NOVA together. The boys can;t wait for their dad to get home and eat dinner so they can watch NOVA.
Tonight is:LORD OF THE ANTS
Ed Wilson IS AntMan! A naturalist that focused his studies on ants. an accident blinded one eye as a child and he has hearing problems- so that kinds eliminated certain animals. His expertise is The Ant.When he was 13 he discovered a new iinvasive species of ants in Alabama (a type of fire ant).He credits his love for knowledge and the knowledge itself to his parents giving him free reign of the woods behind his house as a child and letting his study what he loved.He discovered over 300 different ant species.it's a cool show. The boys (esp Connor) are asking LOTS of questions. he asks a question every 3 seconds- and no one can hear anything and he if he'd be quiet and listen he'd hear a lot of answers..LOL

connor is confused by the classifications of animals. here is part of what I found...
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/eowilson/game.html check it out. Play the ant game.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/eowilson/ read about Ed Wilson, the Ant Man On This Page is a chart in rainbow colors that shows the categories of classifying animals

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_classification don't worry about the other stuff.
here is an example of how one animal is classified
KINGDOM: Animalia (Animals)
PHYLUM:Chordata (they have a spinal chord/backbone)
CLASS:Mammalia (mammals)
ORDER:Rodentia (rodents-Mammals with chisel-like incisors)
FAMILY:Cricetidae (Hamsters, deer mice, lemmings,gerbils, voles)
GENUS:Microtus (Typical voles with open-rooted teeth)S
PECIES:Microtus arvalis (Common vole)

Now these are the basic classes, sometimes they use things that are little more detailed.see here: http://www.abdn.ac.uk/~nhi708/classify/example.html


HERE IS HOW THE SOUTH CHINA TIGER IS CLASSIFIED:
Kingdom:Animalia
Phylum:Chordata
Class:Mammalia
Order:Carnivora
Family:Felidae
Genus:Panthera
Species:P. tigris
Subspecies:P. t. amoyensis