The Dark Floor

The next day Polly did something rare. She folded her wings and dropped down, past the canopy, through the middle of the forest, all the way to the floor. It was a different world. Almost no sun reached the ground. The light was soft and green and dim. The air was cool and still. Her red head was the brightest thing in sight.

A line of green moved across the dark soil. Polly looked closer and saw ants. Each one carried a piece of leaf above its head, like a tiny green sail. These were leafcutter ants, and they were farmers. They do not eat the leaves. They take them underground and grow a special fungus on them. The fungus is their food.

Nothing on the floor is wasted. A fallen leaf, an old branch, a dropped fruit, all of it is broken down fast and used again. In the warm wet air, fungi take everything apart and feed it back to the trees. The forest grows on its own old parts.

On a wide dark leaf, something small and bright caught Polly's eye. It was a frog no bigger than her glasses, blue and black. Its bright skin was a warning, not an invitation. Polly looked but did not touch. All around her, the quiet floor was busier than it seemed.