For years entomologists have been trying to figure out why ants work in the ways they do. Through years of my own research, and as an experienced "antomologist," I've discovered the answer: Ants have been copying the Japanese. It's ant "wa." The wa system has been in place by the Japanese since the beginning of Japanese civilization.
You may point out that ants have been around longer than the Japanese, but I think it is not impossible to say that the ants could have changed their ways after first contact with the Japanese during the Jomon Period (10,000 to 300 B.C.).
Now, I don't know what time most ants wake up in the morning, but I have noticed that the ants on my island wake up at 6 a.m. with the morning chime. Shiraishi ants have adapted to the system. By 6:45, the Tidy Island regime is in full force.