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Just thought id make a new topic for this as the last one was old and the links were all links to malware!
I just wanted to know a couple of things about Crematogaster rogenhoferi - is there any particular factor that is imperative, such as temperature is to P heidologeton diversus?
What do they make the wooden carton nests out of? surely that needs to be supplied?
Crematogaster rogenhoferi is very easy to keep. They don´t really need any special temperature or humidity, they can survive in very dry climates and very humid climates. High temperature is however very good for them.
Those carton nests are made as you said out of wood. The ants chew a little of wood and then with their drool they make this nest. However their nests can as well be in wood. In the genus of Crematogaster sometimes when the colony grows really big ant there is no wood to move into the ants start making those carton nests sometimes even under stones out of dry gras. They don´t really need those nests and even can live in Ytong.
I once read a thread in which the keeper destroyed the nest to look whether or not there was a queen in his colony. In the center there was a small nut in which the queen sat. Which suggests that this carton nest is their primary nest form.
My Crematogaster rogenhoferi some years ago made their carton nest out of mud and a little cotton. I put a hand full of cotton under their nest and they made tunnels trough it and eventually started making it into their next chambers. However that happened extremly slowly as the colony grew. The building of this carton nest takes very much time but the nest is incredibly hard.
Also I can remember that they started using the shells of worms as building material eventually.
I would recommend a rather dry keeping since I can imagine that this carton nest can easily start to mould. It should be rather how in the nest since all Crematogaster I know are rather loving higher temperatures, however a 40W lamp shining on the nest should be just enough.
I belive antstore sends the big colonies in their carton nests at least I got them that way when I started keeping ants.
OK my colony of Crematogaster rogenhoferi arrived. I had spent money on 500- 1000 ants, there is easily 7000 or 8000! So i guess thats good. They are everywhere! I thought the container i had for them would be more than large enough, but they are completely covering it!
Are they standard for honey water and insects or should i plan for something a bit more exotic to feed them?
Does anyone have really super huge colonies? How do you feed them without them escaping?
Well about them not escaping I can sure tell you water doesn´t work.
Oil however does fine even against such huge colonies. Some might die in it but who cares when having such a big colonie?
It is very important to have a lid when you have such big colonies because your colony will just be filled with a gigantic amount of males and winged queens! When I remember right they swarm when it is humid so when you spray they should come out.
However they never mate.
They eat huge amounts of honey, sugar and any kind of protein. You can even feed them frozen mice that is normally fed to snakes and other meat, a colony at that size just eats everything.
They are really basic in their choice of food and feed on pretty much everything. Something that worked was feeding them tuna without the fat from the can, I think it isn´t a great food for ants but it keeps the energy level of the ants high.^^
Also you can feed them earthworms because they are free and if they eat them and you can´t find any more of them you can still buy them at a very low price in a shop with supplies for fishing, they also might have maggots which are great food for ants.
I think you also could start breeding worms, it could pay off.
Watch out when feeding them, they can easiely drown when you feed them a huge amout of honey at the same time since they just pile up on it.
Yeah, they been acting crazy. Ive never owned an ant like them!
Here is my setup:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2963359/My-setup.jpg
They cling on extremely well which means clearing up an escape is very difficult!
I used cotton wool to stop them getting out, but they just take it away to use for building!
There have been alot of dead ones lying around, but i guess this is from the moving process... also they drink LOADS. Putting down a drop of water and they are on it like honey. They have bunched up in the little tank for some reason - ive tried to make the main area better for them but they would prefer to be in the light and without any materials etc. why is this?
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2963359/smaller.jpg
Also, i made a video to show my setup:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JgCtThvQ1pk
Why do they wiggle their gasters when they drink honey water but not normal water? Does this indicate they are enjoying it? is that even possible?
Something interesting - is this species Polygmous? Ive just noticed next to the huge bundle of workers, just out on her own is a queen... if they were monogmous they would be all over her and very protective surely... i dont really understand. Its definitly a queen and not an alate either. What do you think?
Well Crematogaster rogenhoferi start producing alates when the colony is about 3000 workers big so your colony probably has thousands of queens in the nest. They will try to fly away and after some time get killed by the workers.
My colony had a giant pile of killed alates in its basin i belive it is quite normal with such big Crematogaster colonies.
However they have some little bigger and some little smaller workers, probably has to do with the food supply.
About the wiggeling of the gaster; I also observed this. It is quite normal and I belive it might be because they pump the liquid into their further stomache (the crop) in which they store the food they can exchange with the colony later on. The crop is highly flexible and can extend extremly. It is that part that stores the food of the repletes, the "fat" ants in a colony.
So this "wiggling" or much rather the contraction of the gaster is to put some pressure on the crop I belive. However I have never found any form of confirmation for that so it could very well be wrong.
thanks alot, thats really interesting.
Ive got quite a midden pile now, so the death rate is very high, but i guess thats normal in a large colony? I hope im feeding them enough and giving them everything they need rather than causeing the high death rate...