ANTSTORE World of Ants

[trevstonbury]

Hi There,

I am helping my little brother set up an Ant Farm. I bought him an AntSphere set and we have set up all the pods with different habitats (see pics below) but I wanted some advice to see whether the egg chamber that we have made would is ready and would be suitable to house the queen and her eggs. I know the Antsphere set it not really a serious type of farm but we have done our best to set it up well.

As you can see in the pic (roughly to scale) the chamber is set up in one of the spheres. I have used White sand/loam so the ants are visible through the red tinted plastic. Under the sand/loam there is also a small layer of clay granules. I really want to have a good view of the queen/colony so the questions I have are as follows;

1. Should I keep the chambers sand/loam moist and how moist?
2. Have I put too much sand/loam in if I want to be able to view the queen, does the sphere actually need any at all?
3. Any other recommendations for the chamber or Ant Farm/

Egg Chamber

Egg Chamber

Ant Farm

Thanks for your help, much appreciated!!!

Trevor

[jbc]

Hi Trevor.

Well you could tell us what kind of colony do you want to keep there.

1. If you will tell us your ant species then I could say how moist.
2.If you have aprox. so much sand in there the its ok. and you maybe will see the colony.
3.Remember to clean the arenas where your food will be.

[trevstonbury]

Thanks for the quick response,

The species is Lasius niger, thought it would be best for his first colony. Its more important that conditions are suitable then whether we can see her or not but to have both would be nice.

The food is going to bee attached in small feeding chambers that you can connect externaly so it won't be placed inside the main chamber itself.

Kind regards

Trevor

[DigiSERBIA]

This looks so awesome !!! cheers m8


Pozdrav

[jbc]

Yeah Lasius niger is easy to keep.

Will you order the colony, if yes with how many workers?

The moist level should be 50% but the colony adapts easily to many things.

Then good luck with your brothers colony.

[trevstonbury]

I have ordered the queen from Antstore along with 11-25 workers , just waiting for them to arrive

So you think the egg chamber will suit its purpose, or could I remove more of the loam/sand so I can guarantee the queen will be visible?

[jbc]

Well I wouldnt suggest to remove soil.

You could make a hole with a pen near the place where the chamber ends.

[trevstonbury]

So the queen will use that area?

[jbc]

Thats the idea.

Ants themselves dicide it, but then it is a bigger chance.

and you could grease a little bit of coocking oil around the upper holes where you can put your hand in so that they cant escape, and you should regrease every week.

And dont make a to deep hole because the bottom of it will be very solid and the ants wont like it or you could make a deep hole and the bottom of it crunch up with pincette or a stick.

And if you want that they can dig in your queen chamber- moisturise your sand before putting it in so that it is moist and then it will be easier to maintain the humidity.

As i can see you have 8 chambers that is a bit too big for the colony. I suggest to detach 6 chambers and leav the queen chamber and the arena and in the arena should be 1mm of soil so that they dont sattle in the arena

After the colony has stteled in then you can attach the other chambers.

[trevstonbury]

Nice advice!!!

I will try most of the things you just suggested !!!

Thanks!!

[jbc]

Ok try them!

When will your ants arrive, if that isnt a secret?

If you have some other questions then feel free to ask them.

[trevstonbury]

Hopefully today!! Been waiting all week. I bought them off Antstore on Monday but its going to take a bit longer as they have to get from Germany to the UK. I am a bit worried that they won't get here alive if they have been in the post too long

[jbc]

You ordered by GLS?

Dont worry my shipment with L. niger took 6 days and they were alright.

Example- I havent opened my test tubes were are my Lasius niger queens and they all are fine.
Dont worry with them they will be alright

You could worry if you have ordered Myrmica rubra, at the 3rd day, when I caught them, they started to die.

[trevstonbury]

UPDATE!!

I received the queen and workers yesturday! We had problems fixing the testube onto the main sphere, so moved her and the workers into a small detatchable container that you can plug onto the end of of sphere (you can probably see it in the pics above). We Should have let them be but ended moving her into the red sphere and after about an hour we found she had moved herself back!!!

The sphere is damp but not too wet and we have some other containers attached containg some small bit of apple but they don't seem to interested in it.

So at the moment she is seems quite content sitting in the clear white container we have attached to the sphere.

Will the workers bring her food and water? Any idea if/when she will move into the sphere chamber we have prepared? I get the idea its best just to leave them alone.

[jbc]

The workers will bring her food and water. What do you give them as food?

They will move when they will understand that in the egg chamber is better than the test tube.
I suggest to make the egg chamber pitch black inside and where is the test tube , dont cover it with anything so that there is bright.