Well, not quite. NPR has a story about research done at the University of Ulm about desert ants. Scent trails do not work in the desert, so the scientists hypothesized that ants kept track of how many steps away from the nest they were.

The experiment is the coolest part of this entire thing – they set a whole group of ants loose from the nest and they all found the food. Then, the ants got split up into three groups: one group was allowed to return to the nest normally, one group got tiny little stilts attached to their legs (go figure!), and one group got their legs cut off at the knees (not as fun).

The result of this is that if ants do remember how many steps they’ve taken, those with longer legs will take longer strides and walk right past their nest, and those with shorter legs will stop short of the nest.

And guess what? That’s exactly what happened. The experiment is ingenious, the hypothesis was simple, and the results confirmed what the researchers thought. Great science.