The Life of Ants

We have two white Adirondack chairs up on the hill in the side yard.  They are quite pretty up there.  We have never sat up on that little hill before, but now that the chairs are there, we have found it is a wonderful plate to sit and look out on all our property - (which is less than a quarter acre!)    :-)    So I took my ham and cheese sandwich up there for lunch and to read my book.  I noticed a few of these ants walking around on the chair I was not sitting in, and on the arm of which was the plate holding my sandwich.  When I saw a few ants near the plate, I lifted up the sandwich and held it until I had finished it.  I defeated the ants!  I look over at my plate 10 minutes later and I could not believe my eyes!  there was one tiny piece of cheese left on the plate and a swarm of ants were all over it!  Man oh man,  HOW did a few ants get the message to all the other ants?  I guess some of them traveled really quickly from the cheese to where the other ants were.  But it seemed to happen so quickly!  Maybe I should read a book about the life of ants!