ANTSTORE World of Ants

[miszt]

Kapec, the nest will dry out in a few weeks if you dont spray or anything, they should be fine P apicalis are just as at home in a drier climate (eg Mexico) as they are in a rainforest. As long as they have plenty of fresh drinking water. good luck they are fairly hardy ants, i'm sure you will be fine. How big is your colony?

My colony lived in a hollowed out piece of wood very happily, I kept humidity to about 20-30% eventually, as their apitite ment they needed lots of food, keeping it at a higher humidity was problematic

[Kapeć]

I have now 60-70% humidity and temperature is always 25,5 *C (should be more?). My colony have about 15 workers and I don't know where they are now I thought that they prefer tropic, wet climate like Paraponera clavata. I see that they eat a lot . I hope that they will be fine. I'm going to buy some plants from Panama for example ficus and put it in formicarium

Humudity in my room is about 60% but ground in formicarium is wet

[miszt]

If you want to see inside the colony, u definitly dont want to put plants in, they love to dig, as much as live in hollowed out wood....also as you dont know exactly where they have nested, you dont want to risk disturbing the nest by putting plants in (they have a nasty sting! I got stung twice, once on my arm, and once on my neck, not something i want to repeat for sure!!!)

How deep is the substrate? what are you using?

25.5C is fine, anywhere between 24-26C, I had mine in a very long tank, that also had a heat lamp giving a small area at 28+, which they would sumtimes 'bask' in for a few mins, but this isnt essential, if your tank is to small for seperate heat zones, then keep it as it is, they will do fine, to hot and you risk stressing them. These ants also live in fairly 'temprate' climates aswell, although they live in the tropics, they often inhabit cooler areas down to about 24C

They happily live in dry and wet climates, drier is easier to maintain and so you will be less likly to have any probs.

[Kapeć]

I want to make them natural habitat. I want to make something like: part of rainforest in my hause where can I watch ants in their natural habitat. I let them choose place where they want to stay. I also trying to encurage them to build nest near the glass to see what is happening in nest but it isn't realy important. I don't want to force them. The most important are ants and formicarium good looking. I have 5 cm deep substrate it is 8 L humus.

It is also difficult to keep more than 65-70% humidity with good ventilation without special water tank. I didn't put them water tank. They have fresh water for example on plant, glass.

How is it painfull? Like hornet sting?

[Kapeć]

My ants are dieing

3 days = 3 dead ants

Virus attacked them.

[highered]

Where did my post go? I replied to Kapec that this was a dead post, that Miszt went away earlier this year and my post was deleted and long and behold, Miszt himself is in fact back. Hi Miszt, how is South America? I'm sure we would all like to hear about your travels and what known and unknown ant species you have found.

[miszt]

My ants are dieing

3 days = 3 dead ants

Virus attacked them.

Kapec, I find it doubtful you could know it is a virus killing your colony...i suspect that the deaths where just part of the colonies life cycle, if not it is more likly that they picked up a bactirial infection due in part to the high humdity, which can quickly lead to uninhabitable conditions. Make sure they hvae plenty of fresh water every day, access to sugar/honey and that the nest is clean and free from dead insects and mites. If the deaths continue, remove the colony from your tank (into a clean enviroment) and disinfect it with hot water and bleach, be very sure to allow the tank to dry for around 5 days, to ensure all the chlorine has evaporated, rinse with hot water again and allow to dry for a couple more days before you start introducing a clean substrate and nesting area back to the tank (put your substrate and nest into a hot over at 200C for about an hour to sterlise it)

*Obviously do not pour boiling water into your tank, the safest way to use hot water on glass, is to start with warm water, and build the tempreture up, so the glass has time to adapt and wont explode or crack.

Hi Highered! South America was wonderful! although this time I had very little time to investigate as most of the time was spent in the Volcanos (not great ant country at 4500m lol) and the Galapagos! and I also damaged my knee very badly, which has left me a bit imobile sumtimes! I'm back off their again for a proper ant hunting trip soon! (duno what happend to your post tho lol)

[mtrein]

What happened to these colonies? Today I found a Pachycondyla queen (most probably harpax) and I was wondering how you were doing with your apicalis.