ANTSTORE World of Ants

[mzfckr]

i hope it will not be a crime posting a post here, but what time is egg to worker?

Edit Antstore - Verschoben aus dem Fotothread

Hier geht's zum Fotothread:

http://www.antstore.net/viewtopic.php?p=69627#69627

[Necturus]

Not at all;)

i can only roughly estimate at the moment... seems like its around 2,5 - 3 weeks in each of the brood stages, so a total of around 8-9 weeks.
Greetings,
Necturus

[mzfckr]

ive never seem them alive at life, so theres a question.are them really interesting watch only because of golden gaster,or it is just an ''extra''?

[miszt]

I saw them in Gambia earlier this year, they are wonderful ants espcially the majors, are really something to watch, very fast, was like watching little golden beads zooming accross the beach

nice pictures, good to see someone having some success with this species, not many people did in the English forum, including myself, myne didnt even make it to my house alive

[Necturus]

Hey,
other then the nice look, they move in tandem groups, with one worker leading, and a bunch of others following closely by. They seem to be active during daytime, and from what miszt who saw them in their natural habitat says, [edit: didnt see your post Feel free to elaborate more about your observations !] the majors are quite active. Also they are reported to snatch food from other passing ants, though im not certain how i am to simulate that in captivity;) During rain periods, nest entrances are built chimney-like to avoid water entering the nest - again, not sure if i can observe that in my colony.
Personaly i love the bulkyness of the workers and majors. Camponotus sericeus are not as "slim" built as many other Camponotus sp.
Unfortunately theres not a lot too observe at the moment, so all this is a bit theoretical
For the pictures i'm using a light with a red/yellow spectrum. With a white light, the golden pubesence is even more striking, but i'm saving that for out-of-the-nest shots - they stay calm with the current light, while the other one would be causing panic inside the nest.

Yea, there do seem to be some cases of the queen feeding on her own brood. I had a bit of trouble too. My own first born worker died at the age of a few weeks, and i adopted 2 puppae from Parson (thanks again at this point) to make sure colony developement remains stable. I think as soon as a few workers are present, the chances to successfully raise a colony are way higher.

Greetings
Necturus

[miszt]

I took some measurments around one of the nests I found, which might interest you Necturus, they where nesting on the beach, in very damp sand, the outside temp was 35-40C, at 10cm depth the temp was 28C, and at about 50cm the temp was 26C, and it didnt fall much below that even at 1m, there where ants all the way from 10cm - 1m down, although i didnt find the main nest area. At night, the tempreture outside dropped to as low as 5C, although the sand remained at about 15-20C, the latest measurments I did where at 2am, after that the tempreture would have dropped allot, as there is allot of wind, and no cloud cover, mornings where freezing cold, although it warmed up to 25C very quickly, in about an hour, then peaked at 40C at lunchtime.....so I would have expected these ants to be fairly hardy, but not many people had luck with them

the majors where out and about constantly with the minor workers, they where living along side some crematogaster and ponera ants, and definitly seemed to be the dominant species, but then they are 5 times bigger than any of the ants they where living with, quite aggresive ants aswell sumtimes, I was bitten several times lol although out in the open they tend to run away from you, very fast

You could use a sprinkler system to get them to build cimmneys, obviously you will need good drainage, so might not be an option, but i wuld imagine that spraying the nest area every day just with a garden spray may induce them protect their nest with a chimmney


The Golden ants where considered to be a good luck omen to many of the people I met and spoke to in Gambia, because they help subdue the growth of other species like the Ponera, which have a nasty sting, possibly because they steal food from them, as no one could tell me how they subdued other species, I was told they also prevent Termites nesting close to their nests

[mzfckr]

what kind of humidity levels you will produce, if any?Benjamin K. said that they can live with room humidity

[Necturus]

Hey there,
i see they outsorced the conversation
Anyways, both africa and asia have dry and rain seasons (see here for an example of Hyperlinks sind nur für registrierte Nutzer sichtbar). There certainly is ground humidity present, but i'd agree air humidity is secondary and controllable by watering the ground and somewhat limiting air circulation.

Miszt, thanks again, i was using the information you gave in a different thread when setting up temperature levels. Youre making it hard for me to wait untill they get bigger

Also, just uploaded two new pictures to the picture-thread (here).

Greetings,
Necturus

[Kendoras]

Hallo,


sehr schöne Bilder hast Du da.
Danke dafür, dass Du die hier reinstellst.

Wenn ich fragen darf, wie viele Arbeiterinnen hat die Kolonie jetzt?
Wie verläuft es mit der Entwicklung allgemein - Gibt es bei dir auch Ruhephasen?


MfG
Erik M. / Kendoras aka. Ameisen-Fan aka. Waxer

[Necturus]

Hallo Erik,
Danke!
Die Kolonie umfasst nu einige hundert Individuen. Ruhephasen konnte ich noch nicht entdecken... Brut war durchgehend da.
Gruß,
Necturus