In the entire history of entomological study, nothing like this has taken place before.
We had just uncovered a pheromone cluster deep inside an ant colony's remains, within the eastern border of our state river’s embayment. It’s well known among each of us that insect pheromones normally vanish after several weeks at most, but the ones we discovered deep within this colony officially dated back to 1961. Through what can only be described as an anomaly, we can therefore conclude that these pheromones have survived for over six decades. The chemicals had since become the subject of our deep research for months on end, but no words could properly capture our astonishment and surprise once we finally translated these chemicals back into readable English.
Apparently, these pheromones served as an extraordinarily elaborate archive, detailing a long-stretching chain of events pertaining to a group of ladybugs’ affairs inside a neighboring cottonwood tree. According to this archive, these ladybugs, contrary to scientific principles we thought were obvious, had supposedly discovered eusociality, forming a hierarchical enterprise centered around aphid consumption before their eventual collapse. While it lasted, this strange, eusocial arrangement, never facilitated before among ladybugs, seemed to have promised survival prospects through a mutually-assured agreement to avoid cannibalism at all costs.
The power struggle between ladybugs and ants over the aphid species is consistent with behaviors we’ve reported throughout their respective entomological histories, but since there have been no prior accounts whatsoever of ladybugs engaging in eusocial agreements of this (or any) kind, we must mark this under extremely strange and scientifically interesting behavior, completely unlike anything we have studied in the past.
A further reading of this outstanding archive revealed an attribution within these chemicals, when translated to English: A female worker ant who self-identified with the name “Clover.” Appointed by her queen, identified as “Kelvin,” Clover was tasked to emit pheromones as archives for storage within the ant colony’s collective memory. Any further or additional reports within this ant colony have been permanently lost, but according to our research, the pheromone archive we discovered was not stored properly, instead being buried deep underground, as the only currently surviving document of the events within.
It is completely unknown whether any of the insects referenced in this report, their relatives, or their offspring, survive today.
For the sake of observational convenience, we have placed the most approximate timestamp estimates for each event Clover makes reference to in this pheromone archive, as some of the events referenced have taken place within years prior to 1961. We have also decided to preserve the authenticity of Clover’s personal biases, discernments, and judgments regarding each event referenced, of which a substantial amount are pronounced. After all, this worker ant’s capacity for complex judgment, in itself, is a scientific marvel that we believe will be studied for the remainder of scientific history.
We all have worked to the very best of our accuracy, and remain astonished by these findings.
What follows from here is the full document of Clover’s pheromone archive, translated into readable English, for the general public.