Team Leader of the Clean-up Crew

More larvae in Large.   Ewwww.

I've been watching the chirping sparrows clean up on the ant larvae for days now.  It took a little investigating to figure out what they were so interested in on the far side of our yard.  My first hint was of course the images, but I couldn't identify the food at first.  My second hint was the large number of ant hills in this area.  Putting 2 and 2 together, I got the heebie jeebies and realized that these little birds were filling their beaks with ant larvae, repeatedly, all day long.  Yay, birds... keep up the good work.  But, man, the situation is really grossing me out.  

When we moved here a year ago, the lawn was in distress.  Great house, but the yard was overlooked to say the least.  We have come a long way with the garden and made progress with the grass over the last year.  However, certain areas of the lawn still have a lot of room for improvement.  And a big problem with distressed grass is, that it's an open invitation to ants; one insect that isn't so welcome (at least in the large numbers we had) in our yard.  Where we've been successful in our efforts to bring the lawn back to life, the ants have subsided... I guess I have more work to do.  In the mean time, these chipping sparrows are welcome encouraged to dine all they want!