ANTSTORE World of Ants

[amrik singh]

Following what I did read , observed myself in wild colony and artificial nest it seems that Tetramorium caespitum biggest food intake come from small seeds (dandelion , clover , heat , grass... ) .The animal food is constitute of slow moving preys: diverse insects larvae ( caterpillars, maggots , beetle larvae ...) of every sizes and earthworms and carrion of not only insects but a dead lizard , mouse or bird when the occasion occurred. They keep aphids on plant roots only but it seems to be a less important part of their diet. They use foraging gallery's and tracks (mostly covered) and forage far on the ground and underground without climbing on the vegetation , they like the heat but do not like to forage in full sun . Tetramorium does not hunt large fast moving prey except if they constitute a danger or a competitor.
The number of workers in the smallest colony is now several hundreds (I can't count any more) and growing fast .The food intake is now equivalent of two tenebrions pupae +sun flower seed + many dandelions seeds.
The population of the biggest colony is now a few thousands (impossible to count) eating the equivalent of 5 or 6 tenebrion pupae , 8 sun flower seeds and a large quantity of dandelion seeds every day.

[amrik singh]

It is well know that Tetramorium caespitum is an easy sort of ants to keep, tolerant of less than optimal conditions.
I have always found curious that many colony's of T.c in Belgium are languishing in places without enough sun or heat with a smaller, less dynamic population . On the other hand in sunny , warm microclimates they form big , active and dynamic populations .
Ideal temperature for Tetramorium caespitum are those found in southern half of France north of the mediteranean coastal area, north Italia , South Germany , Switzerland continental climate area with warm summers in north America . In these area their dynamism and the population of their colony's can be spectacular and they are the dominant ant specie .South of this area along the mediteranean coastline they occupies shady, wetter places .
So we can conclude that Tetramorium caespitum prefer a warm and moderately dry climate during the active period that permit them to develop to their full potential.

[amrik singh]

Hello again,
I just have just read an article from a team of the University of Natural Resources and Applied Life Science Vienna (Austria ) concerning the Cryptic diversity of the Tetramorium of the caespitum group in Western Europe and North America dating from 2006 .
Tetramorium workers are variable withing the same specie Sometime more so than between species so this studies employed mostly genetic and physical elements that agreed genetic boundaries between species.
doing so they identify a number of species but retain only those who were
represented by a sufficient number of samples and give a geographic repartition map to each.
They describe 8 Species and give a letter instead of a name to avoid argument about names given before: specie A close with Tetramorium specie F in mediteranean area.
'' F ( T. caespitum) in northern central Europe down to north Italia and Hungaryand east to Kiev.
" B from Greece to south Germany and south Ukraine.
T. hungaricum from Greece to Hungary .
specie C in eastern Europe.
" D in south Europe in Spain and to Hungary and Bulgaria .
" G (T. impurum ) from Belgium to Hungary and in Spain .
" E related to T. impurum In southern Europe from south France near the Spanish border to the Caucasus and from Hungary to Greek islands . It is the specie that have spread to north America .

[amrik singh]

Tetramorium sp. E is more aggressive than his relative Tetramorium impurum and can better take advantage of hot summers of south Europe and the continental climate with hot summers in north America. It is surprising that T. sp. E is not only more closely related to Tetramorium impurum than to T. caespitum but also that most if not all European Tetramorium in north America are T. sp.E wile it was considered that it have arrived in north America several times.
Tetramorium sp.E must have come probably to north America more than 300 years ago aboard a ship coming from Southern France or Italy.
surprisingly In Canada and some parts of the US it live in area with much colder summers than in South Europe.

[amrik singh]

The maps that the Austrian team led by B. C. Schlick-Steiner and F. M. Steiner have produced are highly interesting but limited
by the small number of sampled areas so it can give only a general idea of the Tetramorium gr.caespitum species repartition as many areas are not represented . For example all species with sufficient number of samples ( except T.sp. c ) are represented in Austria so we do not know if it is because Austria is an area where species of the South , North and east , mountains and low elevations meet or if it is due to the larger number of samples in Austria . Both explanations are probably true .

[amrik singh]

The biggest colony have now several thousand workers and eat each day one large wax worms and about 4 or 5 medium wax worms (or Tenebrion pupae ), 8 sun fower seeds ,diluted honey and collect a large quatity of dandelion seeds .
The small colony have now about 400 workers I think but also very big piles of pupae so when they emerge the worker population will probably double. They eat only the equivalent of one tenebrion pupae every days ,one sun flower seed ,diluted honney and collect dandelion seeds most of it been pile up in a dry area just outside the nest so they eat about 10 times less than the larger colony .

[amrik singh]

I did read more carefully the list of lineages of T.sp.e .published by the Austrian team . There is only two samples from the US both belong to closely related lineages. One have been found also in Romania , the other have been found in Romania and other countries from Italy to Armenia. It will be premature to give any conclusion yet before we can read the results of more samples.

[amrik singh]

Update .
The small colony has easily doubled it's food intake as I expected .
Now they eat per day sun flower seeds ( 10 for the big colony , 2 for the small one) , diluted honey , a peace of defrost fish
and some wax-worms and/or Tenebrion pupae.

[amrik singh]

Update.
As for the biggest colony two months ago , the small colony become much more aggressive and dynamic when it attained around 800 workers . It now attack fast and massively when it discovered a wax worm , before (maybe 10 days ago) it did recruit only slowly and attacked with little agressivity when presented with living wax worms.

[amrik singh]

Update.
In the past I observed Tetramorium eating carrions of small birds , lizards or mice but 4 days ago I put a small dead bird
(who kill itself by hitting my living room window) one meter from a Tetramorium caespitum nest in my garden but the Tetramorium's did not show any interest and after sometime it was some Lasius niger who come to exploit it.
Now my small Tetramorium colony have grown so that they start to overgrow their nest . I add a small ant farm that I did buy many years ago but never used.
The biggest colony have now a constant activity and seems now to grow much more slowly.

[amrik singh]

Update.
For two or three days the big colony consume twelve decorticate sun flower seeds /day (+small apple piece , dead flies and wax worms). Yesterday they finish it early so today I give 15 and see if they finish it for tomorrow morning .
The small colony is now more than 1000 workers strong and have expand its nesting including larvae to the small ant farm .

[amrik singh]

Since yesterday the foraging activity of Tetramorium caespitum in my garden is much increasing and, as nights become warmer, I think it is time , in this area, to start to look for the first fertilized Tetramorium queens for those who want to start a new colony.

[amrik singh]

This morning I found the "ant table" and the ground around it full of hundreds of foragers from the big colony: They found a way out by bringing heart and trash on the oily anti-evasion on the cable of the warming stone. Good luck I have a mouth aspirator so in one hour and a half I captured most of the stray foragers after reapplying the anti evasion . If the scouts recruit so massively I suspect that I do not give enough food . This morning early all the 15 SF seeds were already gone so today I did give 20 seeds and 6 big and medium size wax worms.
I also discovered that at least big colony's can pierce the husk of sun flower seeds to feed on the inside but I thing it takes to much time to exploit the seed this way so it can be use only as a small supplement.
The big colony worker population must be about 10 000 now ,I think.

[amrik singh]

Update.
The large colony consume still 20 SF seeds a day but only two or three wax worms. This fluctuations are probably the result
of temperature fluctuations that accelerate or slow down the larval grow. But anyway they like much seeds and I am sure that
many wild colony's subsist almost entirely on small seeds.
Last December when I wanted to observed an active Tetramorium colony only lone queen was available but I found two small
colony coming from south Europe in an area where the map of cryptic species indicate the presence of Tetramorium sp E
and one or two other species . I am almost sure that the big colony belong to T. sp E because the bigger sise of at least half of
the workers and it's agressivity . The other colony belong visibly to an other specie with smaller workers ( I think Tetramorium caespitum or T. sp A)

[amrik singh]

The difference between the two Tetramorium colony's is obvious even when they had the same population (at different time).
The colony who is now the biggest one, probably Tetramorium sp.E have about half of it's workers bigger than the biggest
workers of the other colony . The presumably Tetramorium sp.E colony also harvest dandelion seeds and exploit sun flower seeds or peanuts very fast and actively even when the animal food is plentiful ,when to much food is given they loss interest
in the animal food but continue to harvest seeds at the same level. The other colony workers are smaller ,the same size as the Tetramorium caespitum that I can observe in Belgium and are much less interested in seeds : They harvest dandelion seeds slowly and when much animal food is given lost interest in sun flower seeds or peanuts.