ANTSTORE World of Ants

[adam james]

Hello Jbc , thankyou for your comments , its great when our colonys are doing so well.

goodluck with your colonys too

Regards

Adam

[bugsy]

Any updates Adam? The garden must be large now

[adam james]

Hello Bugsy , im afraid not the fungus garden didnt grow very large during summer as i had hoped , so its been suffereing due to the lack of fresh leaves.Also i have had a major blow last week to the colony i went away for a few weeks and my boiler broke so no heating , when i came back the ants very hardly moving , i have moved them to a incubator at 25 c to try and get the colony to build up again, i must have about 40 workers from the few hundred a month ago

Will keep everyone updated , i just hope they pull throu , the queen seems ok thou.

Regards

Adam

[bugsy]

Surely its cheaper and less risky to purchase a heat matt with a thermostat. Even just using it on an empty chamber will allow the heat to flow through then they can move or stay if they want. Hope all goes well mate, glad to hear the queen is still alive and well tho. Keep us posted.

[adam james]

Hello Bugsy yes i did try this but it caused way too much condensation , at least with the incubator it doesent. But hopfully things will be good now and they will pick up , i have spotted what looks like a small bunch of eggs by the queen so hopfully they will start leaf cutting soon

Regards

Adam

[adam james]

Hey guys just thort id let you all know that sadly i checked on my leaf cutting ants last night and the queen was dead , , she was curled up next to the fungus garden. I knew somthing was wrong yestarday during the day as she was acting weired , she keept on ripping into the fungus garden with her mandibles and then sorta falling off it.

I will try this species again next year.

Regards

Adam

[Andie]

Sorry to hear that Adam I was hoping to try again next year also but i have a feeling i'm going to have to many other species by then,,, i'm soooo impatient.

[bugsy]

Sorry to hear mate, it all looked so good for a while. Are you going to try with a different species in the mean time?

[adam james]

Hello Andie , cheers mate , yeah i know lol have seen your colonys and read your blogs , great stuff.

Hello Bugsy , yeah mate i will be trying with anouther colony , but not atta , as soon as i got back and noticed the damage to the colony i put the container in my incubator and started converting there old setup with heating cables to warm the containers up , had problems with condensation thou which i have now solved thankfully , but to be honest i knew getting my Atta colony to pull throu was going to be difficult,

Due to me being impatient also lol i have ordered anouther colony which arrives next week , but these are not leaf cutting ants. Im just keeping my fingers crossed they travel safe and im assured they will. Also i wont post too much to begin with as this is a really hard species to keep and i feel i dont want to put up a thread that ends with a bad experiance if the colony fails.

Its hopfully going to succed and have every confidence, ive kept alot more ants since the first time i had some and this is a rather large colony so it should do ok.

O the species is Pheidologeton diversus im receiving a colony with two queens and 1000 + worker population.

Regards

Adam

[bugsy]

Awesome make sure your outbreak protection is good. These given the chance will swarm, but i'm sure you already known. Good luck mate. Mark Moffett adventures among ants has a great section this species.

[adam james]

Hey bugsy , yeah deffinatly , i know yeah they are like the ninjas of the ant world at escaping lol , nest containers are sealed and the foraging tank is sealed also so hopfully no escapes , just going to do some tweaks to the setup the weekend so its totally ready. so far im getting a temperture of 27 c in the nesting chambers , is this ok , ive read that p diversus like it really warm.

[bugsy]

Yeah they do, but its the humidity that is essential, this is what makes them difficult to keep. Excessive moisture starts unwanted fungus growth that will kill them, its a fine balance. Its not just the nesting chamber that needs humidity but the outworld too. The queen is a laying machine so the colony will eat an unreal amount of protein. Are you using a y-tong within a basin or straight sand/loam?

[adam james]

I was considering a y-tong but last times experiance taught me they are not too impressed with them. Im putting a shallow layer of sand on the bottom of the containers i built for the attas. The moisture is no problem , i will keep a eye out for moulds thou. hopfully they will burrow into this and it being shallow means i can still see in chambers etc, the whole setup is humid, i have even poured gypsum in the tubing system to the foraging tank so that the whole walkway there they wont dry out , i hear they go on long foraging trails.

i will upload some pictures of the converted atta setup over the weekend , maybe i can ask one of the moderators to unlock my old Pheidologeton diversus thread.

Adam

[AntsNational]

Hey guys just thort id let you all know that sadly i checked on my leaf cutting ants last night and the queen was dead , , she was curled up next to the fungus garden. I knew somthing was wrong yestarday during the day as she was acting weired , she keept on ripping into the fungus garden with her mandibles and then sorta falling off it.

I will try this species again next year.

Regards

Adam

Hi Adam,

I'm devastated to hear about your queen and colony, this deeply saddens me. I hope you have better luck next year!!! Do you know why she died?

Regards,
Vasile

[adam james]

Hello Vasile , yeah i know what went wrong , i was away a few weeks with work and my Nan was looking after things , but my boiler wasnt working and with the cold tempertures my bungalow resally got cold , by the time i had come back nearly all the workers had died and the fungus was looking really damaged. It had a bronzy colour and the remaining workers were not bothering with it , I warmed them up and things looked promising , the queen was being tended and i hoped all was going ok , there were only about 15 workers when i counted and no eggs larva or pupae. Well this i think is what has caused the queen to die .

Regards

Adam