When I looked out my back window this morning I noticed what appeared to be a big patch of black soot on my lawn. I went out for a closer look and found thousands of these winged reproductive ants climbing the blades of grass and flying off into the distance. The sky was thick with ants taking off (see last photo below). The ants appeared to be programmed to seek out the highest possible point before taking off. I did an experiment to see if this was indeed the case by allowing some of the ants to start crawling up my arm. Once they were halfway up my arm I raised my arm into the air and all the ants immediately switched direction. The ants then took off once they reached the tips of my fingers. I raised and lowered my arm a couple of times and each time the ants switched direction, always heading up towards the sky.