Sweet

I didn't do a bug walk today because the temperature was in the 30s (39ºF. But hey, 30s is 30s), and because it was doing a drizzle/flurry combo that was not good for my camera, but I did walk around a little bit after I went out to get the mail, to see what was out there. And I did find something mildly interesting...

 This tree has a row of newly-made holes in it (woodpecker's work), and sap is running out of the holes, and the sap has attracted ants. It was a big surprise to me to see a dozen or so ants on the tree, feeding on the sap (which is basically a kind of sugar water, obviously attractive to ants). After all, it's COLD out. And there have not been a lot of ants around lately, maybe I'll see one or two when it's about 15ºF warmer than this. What I want to know is, if the ants are in their nest underground somewhere (which is where I assume they have been hanging out), how did they even know that there was all this sap running on this tree?