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badman: My camponotus seem to have gone into permanent hibernation (11. Okt 2008 20:58)

Both my herculaneus and ligniperda have not taken any food or emerged since springtime.

I know they are still alive as I can see into the herculaneus nest and the ligniperda are still in their tube. Both still have broods and the queens are alive. But the colonies are not growing and there are no caccoons.

When they came out of hibernation they would take insects honey, and mealworms, but now I place food in the tanks and it goes completely untouched. I have also not seen them above ground or out of the tube. This follows a strange incident where my some of my ligniperda workers went crazy and started fighting eachother. Both tanks have some small bugs living inside them, they are not living on the ants themselves so do not seem like parasites. I've tried varying the temperature and humidity but nothing I do seems to make any difference.

JimmyVe: Re: My camponotus seem to have gone into permanent hibernation (12. Okt 2008 10:29)

As you probably know these ants grow really slow and it is possible that they are already back in hibernation.
About the brood, did it develop from spring till now or is it still the same ?
How big are these colonies ?

The small bugs are probably mites, if they are whit/grey than they don't harm the ants, they just eat from the bugs you give to your ants. If they are black they could be a problem.

badman: Re: My camponotus seem to have gone into permanent hibernation (20. Okt 2008 17:26)

the colonies are under 20 ants. During spring some of the brood hatched, but since the first batch of caccoons there haven't been any more.

The mites are silver or grey. I think since they haven't done anything for months anyway I might as well get them ready for hibernation

JimmyVe: Re: My camponotus seem to have gone into permanent hibernation (20. Okt 2008 18:54)

Don't think the mites harm your ants.
Probably best to hibernate them now and wait until spring to see if the larvae grow into nice workers.

gabranth: Re: My camponotus seem to have gone into permanent hibernation (20. Okt 2008 23:43)

are you able to get rid of the mites?

JimmyVe: Re: My camponotus seem to have gone into permanent hibernation (21. Okt 2008 16:45)

Those small white (grey) mites you can not get rid of. If you feed you ants insects (and almost every species needs them) you will have those little mites. They don't harm your ants so i don't see much problem in it.

gabranth: Re: My camponotus seem to have gone into permanent hibernation (21. Okt 2008 21:46)

in small quantity's there harmless