Giant swarm of flying ants buzzes area

SAUGUS – A massive swarm of flying insects invaded much of the Greater Boston area Wednesday evening, leaving many North Shore residents scratching their heads, and not because of bug bites.Saugus resident Bob Divola said the swarm was “crazy” and described the bugs as “small flying ants.” A bug expert says he?s essentially correct.?I came out of my house and they were everywhere,” said Divola. “I went to (my) son?s hockey practice at Kasabuski and they were there also. They were flying all around and landed on everything, the house, the car ?”Divola said he went to Kasabuski Rink at around 5:30 and after practice was over about an hour later, he said they were all gone.Brenda Sobolewski Finn said she had her car washed at around 5 p.m. and after going to a Market Basket, she came out to find the bugs “everywhere.”?(They were) stuck all over the car but I thought they were from the water residue,” said Finn, who lives in Tewksbury and used to live in Saugus.Thankfully Finn said they didn?t ruin her freshly cleaned car as the bugs just blew off as she was driving.Dr. Robert Stevenson, associate professor of biology at the University of Massachusetts Boston and self-proclaimed “bug guy,” said the swarm was most likely queen ants emerging from their nests all at once to reproduce.?There?s this phenomenon where a colony will say, ?OK, it?s time to send out the new queens and males to mate with them ?? you can see it locally a lot at different times in the summer,” said Stevenson. “When the new queens first come out they fly and the males chase them ? and they would come out in huge numbers.”Stevenson said the tropical downpours that swept through the area earlier this week may also have led to even more ants emerging than usual.?One thing that makes sense to me is that after these warm rains, it would be a natural time for them to do it,” said Stevenson. “It was so humid yesterday I was just astounded. My guess is that?s what happened.”Small flies could be seen floating past the windows in the Daily Item newsroom in Lynn Wednesday while Twitter and Facebook users also reported them from Boston up to Peabody and Salem.Stevenson said strong winds could have helped concentrate the flying ants near the shore.?This kind of concentration sounds like something I?ve read about but I?ve never seen myself,” said Stevenson.Stevenson also noted that people would be surprised at just how many ants live beneath them.?I?ve spent some time working in Georgetown and just for fun we calculated on the soccer field that there were about 20 nests per square meter,” said Stevenson. “We think maybe there were at least 80 to 100 ants per nest. So we figured there must have been 40 million ants in this one area ? two acres. You can imagine if all the ants decided to reproduce.”Matt Tempesta can be reached at [email protected].