Niko Holstege: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (23. Mai 2011 16:14)

Thanks again for the good advice for moving the ants. I've got a whole setup prepared, so it will hopefully be fine. I'll let you know how it developed :)

On the bisque tiles; the link you gave me is unfortunately not so good after all :( The site doesn't seem to ship outside of the USA? for now. I've send them a mail, but have no reply yet.

So, i've been thinking a lot and came up with the idea of a gypsum plate. I can make one myself (even with grooves on one site) and it could be finished within a few hours. Would that be a good idea? Gypsum is also pretty porous and once it has dried it will probably not fall apart again...
Otherwise it would maybe be possible to get the whole layer of glazing of a normal tile with some sanding paper (hope that is the good word :) ) or just use a glazed tile upside down and also not overwater it (in that case the water would be absorbed also, there's just no extra draining function so watering the tile should be done with care...

Well, if you have some more thougths on the subject let me know, if not, thanks for all your help so far :D

adam james: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (23. Mai 2011 16:36)

The gypsum plate idea sounds good and im sure that would work ,O right ok i didnt know where that place was i assumed it was near you. I dont think youd be able to sand the glazing off the tile because the tiles absorb moisture and the glazing paint would of been absorbed into the tile so sanding it off wont make much of a diffrence to be honest.

I think the gypsum tile will be your best idea i think.

Goodluck and i look forward to the pictures :grin:

Niko Holstege: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (23. Mai 2011 23:53)

Ok well; I've made my own gypsum tile tonight, completely with a extra drainage area underneath it, so hopefully that will work for now :) The gypsum seems to get a little weak when it gets wet, hopefully the ants ignore it and don't start to bite it...

After that I moved the colony onto their new gypsum plate. Everything went very easy and fine! Thanks for the brush idea, it worked very good with the tinyest ants, probably a lot better than the claspers I use on my other ants :D The fungus I got from Antstore was placed/growing on a bramble leaf and I've decided to let it stay on there... evenually it will die/rot away, but I guessed the ants would be able to manage that, they are still leaf-cutters in the end. The moving of the leaf with a bend spoon was very easy and the fungus didn't break or was damaged at all. The ants are now exploring their new area and seem to like it...most of them are already continuing their 'daily' routine and are attending the fungus and drinking from the apple which was there already, they seem to love it a lot! I hope they'll do fine on their new ground.

So, as I was looking through all the forum post I noticed that everyone's queen is always on top of the fungus. Mine however is always sitting next to it on the leaf... Sometimes she looks into the closest holes in the fungus but she rarely sits on it, would that be normal? The workers are still cleaning her and walking on top of her, so she's still connected to the colony very closely.

Also I was really wondering if you keep your ants completely in the dark, or if you give them a light/dark cycle? I read somewhere that Atta's don't seem to mind a 12 hour dark/light cycle, but since they naturally live underground, a 24 hour dark period would seem more natural, how is your experience with that?

Ow..and on the pictures, I'll get to borrow a very good macro camera in a 3 weeks. Until than I'll upload some pictures with another camera and start an own blog soon!

adam james: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (24. Mai 2011 07:10)

Well sounds like they are doing well , They should leave the gypsum alone , but it depends on how solid it stays together. Regarding the queen sitting on the fungus , my queen moves all over it , at the moment she is sitting to the side and clinging onto it. They do need to be in direct contact with the fungus garden so as long as she is not sitting away from it i assume she should be ok , When the fungus garden grows bigger you will proberly notice they will build the fungus around her and she will sit in a small fungus chamber. :D

Now the lighting i have found no problem , My setup has low wattage strip lights above each shelf the containers are on and i leave the lights on all the time when im there , i only turn them off when i go out and at weekend they are usally on the whole time. My ants dont seem to mind and everything carrys on as normal.

I look forward to your pictures and Blog :grin:

Ps, My new macro lenses have just arrived :P , so i will be taking pictures after work and will update soon

Regards

Adam

Niko Holstege: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (24. Mai 2011 15:24)

Thanks for the answers on the light and queen's location. I noticed today that the queen was sitting on the fungus again and the ants haven't tried to bite the gypsum, so it seems to be going fine. So far I've also been using low wattage light bulbs and they also seem fine with it. Whenever I light one of my other colony's the ants go crazy, but the Atta's don't even seem to notice it. Very nice for observing them :)

I look forward to your pictures, have fun with your new macro lenses!

Greetz
Niko

adam james: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (25. Mai 2011 07:15)

Hey guys well i managed to get a few minutes to play around with my new lenses for my camera , i will have to change some settings on the camera as any macro images i take come up all orange :lol:.

There hasnt been much really to update on , that is usally the case when the leaf cutters are so small its just really a few months of slowly building up before they get more exciting. The Fungus garden is growing well and the queen is healthy aswell , she moves around the fungus garden every now and then. New workers are being born , i have spotted a few slowly walking over the garden, they are a very pale orange.

Well i managed to take one picture but the file was too big and i cannot upload it , i will take some more tonight and maybe also i will try to get a video up :D

adam james: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (26. Mai 2011 07:29)

Hey guys heres a few pictures i managed to take last night , I do have a video aswell but it doesent seem to upload on here , Maybe somone can explain how to upload videos lol. :D

Atta Queen
PICT0021.JPG
PICT0026.JPG

Workers tending the fungus garden
PICT0027.JPG

Fungus garden development so far
PICT0028.JPG

Worker leaf cutting
PICT0033.JPG

And heres the dead fungus garden and Ant grave yard :lol:
PICT0032.JPG

Well thats my update so far if i figure out how to upload this video then ill put that up aswell. :)

Regards

Adam :wink:

Niko Holstege: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (29. Mai 2011 12:38)

Looks good! Very nice and detailed pictures, the first to are beautiful!! :D

Greetz
Niko

Fraaap: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (29. Mai 2011 12:58)

Great setup... i like it :D

adam james: Re: Leaf cutting Ant Farm Project (29. Mai 2011 22:17)

Cheers Guys , just waiting for them to slowly build up so they get more interesting lol :grin:

Regards

Adam 8)

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