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TomUSA: New Acromyrmex versicolor from USA (24. Jul 2009 20:54)

Hello from USA. I recently recieved new Acromyrmex versicolor queens from Arizona USA. They came 3 in a small pile vial with damp paper shreds. The seller has not replied to my questions so I am poting them here for advice. Thanks in advance!

Should I leave them in the vials until they produce a brood?

I placed a heat lamp over them as they said they like it hot?

Any other thoughts?

JimmyVe: Re: New Acromyrmex versicolor from USA (28. Jul 2009 19:33)

You need experience for these ants. But i'm sure you know that already.

They need to be sepurated. They need Fungus.

About 26-28°C would be perfect (not to hot) and they like high humidity.

Bytewars: Re: New Acromyrmex versicolor from USA (28. Jul 2009 19:39)

i have A cromyrmex spec. my ants and the fungus loves 22-26°C you never go over 28°C because the fungus die.
sry for my bad english

greetings from germany
Bytewars

mpke: Re: New Acromyrmex versicolor from USA (29. Jul 2009 12:33)

25°C is the best.
I also have A cromyrmex spec ( 4 litres fungus ) and they are doing greate on 25°C.

GoliX: Re: New Acromyrmex versicolor from USA (7. Sep 2009 16:27)

It's probably best not to seperate them. Acromyrmex versicolor are usually multi-queen colonies, and they have a better chance of founding a colony when there is more than one queen. They also use one queen to collect leaves to feed the fungus. If seperated the lone queen will still have to collect leaf pieces for the fungus. On the other hand the amount of queens doesn't seem to affect the growth rate of a colony, so 3 single queen colonies will grow just as fast as long as they manage to found a colony.

Some interesting information here: http://beheco.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/10/5/585