ANTSTORE World of Ants

[adam james]

Hello Guys , i thought i would start a new thread On my Pheidologeton diversus colony , I hope the Mods dont mind , I felt being as my colony now have a fresh start and my setup is now complete i would start a new topic as it would be lucky.

Well My Colony was failing , i had started with a two queen colony and 2000 + workers and brood but complications with ant setups and stress on the ants ment i lost one of the queens , the remaining queen didnt start laying properly untill the 3 rd week after i recieved them , by then the workers had started dying from old age. Workers only live about a month.

The colony slowly dwindled away and i was down to only a few workers , luckily i managed to aquire about 5000-10.000 workers and lots of brood so they had a salvation The New workers arrived and introduction to the queen and remaining few workers was done slowly , acceptence was achived and now the queen has begun egg laying again. The colony has not settled in totally , they have just started using some pieces of the plaster nests and substrate to fill in gaps and modify there nest chambers.

The nest desighn is housed in a modified bookcase , it has heating , and ventalation , provided by a thermostate controlled soil warming cable. Also there are four reptile fans built into the bottom to provide air circulation. There are also two vents on the side of the bookcase. The bookcase is also fitted with three low wattage striplights , these have red clear acrylic covers over to provide red light . this doesent seem to disturb the ants ( who are extremly sensative to light in nesting chambers) but allows great observation.

The Ants have 6 plaster moulded nests , with moulded chambers and galleries in them. These are connected by 20 mm clear acrylic piping. There is also a foraging tank the plaster nests connect upto. The tank is a woodland desighn and i have moulded a ant hill and the piping is attached to this. The ants exit from this too and it looks cool . The ants have not yet explored past the gypsum nest but the workers and all soldiers are greatly swollen with food.

Here are some pics of introducing the ants and of the setup.

Ants arrived in these 6 traveling tubes , each containes lots of workers , soldiers and brood

Many workers and a soldiers

Adding the workers to each gypsum nest , One tube to each nest

Woodland themed Foraging tank

Moulded Ant hill

Nest Desighn

Fans for air cirulation in the bookcase , makes temperture more stable

Plaster nest Layout , notice the pipe connection layout

Thats my updates so far , hope you enjoy reading , will update again soon

Regards

Adam

Edit Uta

[adam james]

Hey guys , The colony was doing well , queen had produced loads of eggs and its off to a great start , a fresh load of workers were added and it couldent be better , but once again i am upset , and frustrated , the colony slowly moved lower down to the bottom plaster nests and vacated the others and here they stayed , Now they havent foraged much but the soldiers gasters are still extended with food and most the brood left is now pupae. I have noticed thou that they had covered the glass with bits of plaster , annoying but harmless enougth, This was hiding somthing very bad thou.

The colonys population of minor workers has been dropping very quick and yet i couldent see any bodys in the trash pile , i have made a shocking discovery , it was only while watering the nest last night i noticed a major soldier walking around in the bookcase , on closer inspection there was anouther dead between the heating cables, when i looked behind the nests i am shocked to find masses of dead workers and a hole in the back of the nest. they had chewed throu several inches of plaster. the workers that came out have died due to getting into contact with the heating cables , or maybe the lack of moisture outside the nest was the cause , i am really frustrated and upset with this , , i think maybe no success can be made with thses ants unless you just put them in a tank full of soil and let them get on with it.

The queen is fine and there are still workers , lots of major minor soldiers so i hope all will be well. I have had to move them out and into a temporary container with test tubes in and moist sand , they have moved into the test tubes and have started blocking the test tube fronts up. They shall remain here untill i can get a ytong nest assembled. I reaken this they wont chew out of.

I will also build a perspex case around it to confine them should they do so.

Sorry its not a more uplifting update.I am very angry at moment , i really set my heart on keeping this species but its proving far more difficult then i had ever imagined , i leave them alone other then to water and watch them , they have 70 -80 % humidity in the nests and 26 -28 c temperatures. I dont understand it. I certainly wont be getting anymore !! should these fail , its turning out to be very off putting.

Regards

Adam



Edit 26/01/2012

The colony have destressed and settled in again. I linked up two containers with a inche of plaster in the bottom to there temperory container , on waking this morning i am surprised to find they have moved from the test tubes and spread out in these. The queen is there and being fed and groomed aswell. There are only a few minor workers thou , i counted 3 looking in I will now leave them here , the colony consist of media , major workers and minor , media , major and mega major soldiers. Most have greatly extended gasters , but i will put in a few fruit flys tonight.

I am just curious and wonder if there may be somthing wrong with my queen , she lays eggs fine but after nearly two weeks they dont seem to hatch , they usally disapear then,, also its interesting to note that the queen that died shortly after arriving with me was alot more stockyier then this queen who was smaller, now the brood that arrived with my rescue attempt workers have turned to pupae and the pupae that had arrived eclosed fine. I did lose alot of it during the few days after transport and alot ended up being dumped in the trash pile the ants had made looking a greyey browny colour.Im assuming the temperture changes during transport was the cause and being neglected while the colony settled in

Anyway thats the latest so far , i want to succedd with these ants soo bad and after thinking about it i think the set backs just make me more determined to succedd

regards

Adam

[adam james]

Hello Guys well after the stress of moving the colony manually , they have now settled in , the containers have proved to be to the ants liking , The colony has now got a trash area sorted and a few soldiers are dead in there , not any deaths the past two days and the last few soldier pupa have eclosed .

I have fed them a cricket and the soldiers quickly got hold of it and killed it , they have stripped it down to a little cricket sausage and are taking turns in eating it aswell.

The queen is still being tended and her gaster is slightly swollen so im hoping she will start her egg laying cycle soon , as far as i can tell there are no eggs or larva so she needs to get a move on.

I managed to take a few pictures.

Heres the queen in the background

As soon as the light from the camera hits her , the soldiers start covering her.

Ready for attack , protecting her Queen

Soldier eating Cricket

As soon as more happens i will update again soon

Regards

Adam

[Andie]

Your determination will be your success adam what are you using for breakout protection, looks like axle greese

Oh and sorry if i'm not supposed to post here,,,i never know

[adam james]

Hello Andie , cheers for the comments mate , I certainly hope they succeed. Yeah that's axel grease well grease lol , I found out it works great and doesent seem to dry out or get effected by moisture. The ants don't seem to like it , they reach it , touch it with there antenna and then turn away.

Regards

Adam

[Andie]

Ha ha,,,thought i recognised it, i'm gonna have to try this too.

[bugsy]

Sorry to go off track but how did the person you acquired your extra workers off get them all in test tubes? Do they put them in the fridge to slow them down then stick them in tubes? It seems an impossible task, there is obviously a trick to it ??????? Can someone enlighten me please I've always wondered.

[adam james]

Hello bugsy , basically he collected the workers with a shoval , then put the soil and workers into big tubs and attached plaster nests to the tubs. He let the soil in these tubs dry out and they were exposed to light , while the plaster nests were kept dark and moist. The ants prefer dark moist places so over a period of a few days they moved out the tubs and into the plaster nests, he then did the same again but let the plaster nests dry out and he kept the traveling tubes moist and dark.

Hope that helps abit

Regards

Adam

[bugsy]

Ah okay, makes sense. Suppose its fairly easy with a very polygenic species. You can use workers from any colony to bolster your own. Shame we don't live in Asia.

[adam james]

i know , i wish i was there , lol , would love to go into garden and scoop up a few thousand workers and add them to my colony

Well guys the colonys is shrinking down more , the queen still hasnt laid but there are now about 50 soldiers left. I have moved them to a test tube with soil in and water trapped behind a cotton bung as the setup is far to big for such a small colony now, im still hoping she lays soon.

Will keep you guys updated.

Regards

Adam

[TheUneXisted]

Remove majors, they are useless in the current stadium of your colony.

[adam james]

Hello unexisted , i relise that but they are the only ones left feeding the queen , i would prefer her too be carried on being fed as long as possible other wise theres no one else to feed her , plus she hasnt even laid yet.

Regards

Adam

[Elune]

Are you sure they are feeding the Queen ? My first Colony had one Major, and not much worker left. At the end, the Major had much to eat and the Queen died. Well he didnt feed her at all. You should reconsider.... and listen to unexisted. One sign that the Queen doesnt get enough food is that she isnt laying new eggs.

mfg

edit : You have no workers left ? Oo

[adam james]

Im pretty sure the queen is being fed , the soldiers gastors are swollen with food and its the queen who follows them around and begs them for the feeding. They also clean her and i feel she will have less chance by herself. Also the soldiers are still killing and eating crickets.

Yes thats correct i have no workers left , some got killed when they escaped and dried out , and the few that were left have no slowly thinned out and the very last one died out a few days ago.

Regards

Adam

[Elune]

Well, for myself, i have no hope left without workers but hey, that doesnt mean i hope she dies. I wish you luck and hopefully iam wrong ! Reminder : Thats not ironic, i really hope she makes it !

mfg