Thread by @TanisBP

UP NEXT: 2-seed Coyote & Badger (Canis latrans & Taxidea taxus) versus 15-seed Ants & Aphids (Formica cinerea & Aphis varians) #2019MMM

Our battle today takes place within Dinosaur National Monument along the Green River in Colorado. It has been another dry winter and the entire desert is feeling the impacts. (nps.gov/dino/index.htm) #2019MMM

Coyote was going along looking for tasty ground squirrels to eat. But making your way in the prairie today takes everything you've got. Taking a break from all your worries sure would help a lot. #2019MMM

Coyote could chase down the squirrels but they would just dive into burrows. With his powerful nose, Coyote can smell the tasty food just below his grasp. But he also smells something else... #2019MMM

Coyote recognizes that powerful musk as Badger! Without other Coyotes around to help, the Badger is too powerful for Coyote to kill & eat. #2019MMM

Badger has also been unsuccessfully hunting all day. Every time he uses his large claws to dig, the little morsels of ground squirrel run away. #2019MMM

When our adaptations combine the power to get food is ours! #BadYote #2019MMM

Waiting for fleeing squirrels while Badger digs, Coyote plops down next to some fireweed. He vaguely aware of things moving about the stems. #2019MMM

Covering the stems are aphids! Each aphid tips the sales at a whopping 1.7 milligrams!! But the insects have numbers, with herds in the hundreds! #2019MMM

The aphids are tapped into the phloem, and....*ahem* excreting delicious honeydew from the end of the gastrointestinal tract. #2019MMM

Carefully watching over the flock of aphids are their ant shepherds. Harvesting that sweet honeydew! #2019MMM

Coyote is not above eating ants (or anything really), & starts licking them off the fireweed (bit.ly/2OeXZ1R). #2019MMM

The Ants will not allow their flock of aphids to be disturbed & mobilize with numbers! #2019MMM

Hoisting their aphids up & off the plant, the Ants move them to a safer position... an underground nest! (bit.ly/2TMPFME) #2019MMM

Meanwhile, Badger is in hot pursuit of a delicious squirrel cowering underground. One young squirrel is trapped in a shallow burrow, & Badger is plowing towards it! #2019MMM

As Badger locks down & eviscerates the hapless squirrel, it fully shatters the nest of ants and aphids! They all scatter back above ground, only to be licked up by Coyote #2019MMM #BadYote

COYOTE & BADGER DESTROY & DEVOUR ANTS & APHIDS!!!! #2019MMM