ANTSTORE World of Ants

[Santa Claus]

Last friday I received acromyrmex queens (14 days in journey). I've put them into test tubes (with water and cotton) and add green rose leaf to every tube.
2 days - no new fungus here

Please, help me to understand some things!

1. How much time I have to wait for appearing new fungus in a test tube? Or I have to buy fungus?

2. Where I can buy fungus for acromyrmex? I live in Ukraine (not EU).

3. I saw atta colony in Moscow zoo - may be I can try to get those fungus for acromyrmex, or this fungus isn't for acro (only for atta)?

Thanks in advance for any useful information!

[miszt]

they are diffrent fungus, and wont help, so get sum Acro fungus from a shop

or from here, if they have any in, they seem to have only Acro Octo

get it ASAP

[miszt]

o dear, well good luck then!

Keep her warm, 25 degrees, and humid, and feed her leaves reguly so she can make her fungus, and she may well be ok...its gona be hit and miss tho i'm afraid, but she may well be able to make the fungus for herself, its hard however to replicate perfect conditions for a queen on her own

[Santa Claus]

Miszt, I need to try my luck
How long queen can survive without fungus?
If I have to wait a fungus for a long time, may I feed acro queen sugar water or fruit?

[miszt]

Acro will take fruit, give it a try i'm afraid i dont know whether they eat it directly or use it for the fungus, i suspect for the latter

she should be able to surivive a month or two without fungus, but she should start making her own fungus at some point soon, if she is interested in the leaves you are giving her, thats a good sign

what is she housed in btw?

[JimmyVe]

I think she is housed in a tube miszt.

@ Santa Claus: Hi, well i have a bit experience with Acromyrmex . You said the trip was 14 days long, that is to long for the fungus to survive. When the queen flays out (from the old nest) she will take a little bit fungus with her to start off, but that piece is really small so it needs to be taking care off wright away, (new leafs) but if you send the queen without workers and new leafs the fungus will soon die (with in a week)

You need to buy fungus soon (ore get it somewhere) the sooner the better, i had a queen that survived 4 months without fungus but she was the tired to start a colony after all. So the sooner you have fungus the better.

Make sure your fungus is in a good place so it can not dry out but still has fresh air. A glass convex are something would be great.
You can buy some here at Antstore.

You can feed the queen everything (with that i mean): Insects (very small) fruits, honey ore sugar/water and leafs. The leafs she will take in for sure but the change she will start a new fungus is very low.

I had a few queens myself and a small colony for over a year but the fungus died and so did the queen and workers after it.

[mzfckr]

why the fungus is so important to the queen?they just can live with fruits,insects and LITTLE bit fungus?

[JimmyVe]

They live of the Fungus ! The workers cut everything in to small pieces and than use it to make the fungus grow. Than the ants eat from this fungus. The queen can survive from fruits and insects but not for long, it is not there normal food.

[Skippy]

@ mzfckr

because it si leafcutter ant and it like fungus ... no easy to keep here - insects and fruits from Europe... ... must be reasen for what is this and hard to keep , and here is answer

[Santa Claus]

Some days ago a person was kindly agree to send me some fungus (via my friend in Berlin). He sent it today. He put two piece of fungus - yong and old once.
I hope my friend will help me to get this fungus quickly and alive...

[Santa Claus]

This night my friend sent me fungus from Berlin to Kiev, but I saw the news about strike on railway this morning
Is anybody know if my train start yesterday in 21:27 - is it stopped by workers on strike or not?
This train had to be in Warshava by 06:04...

[Santa Claus]

Thanks to all for helpfull information about Acromyrmex!
Fungus came last freeday (16 Nov). Now queen is ok. She packed up little pieces of fungus and look after it with care.
New pics I'll place into my gallery: Hyperlinks sind nur für registrierte Nutzer sichtbar.

[JimmyVe]

Good job Santa Claus. Very nice pictures to !

Did the workers accepted the queen ? Hope she will start a nice colony for you.

[Santa Claus]

Thanks Jimmy:)!
Workers are alone, they carrying for reserve piece of fungus. I'm affraid to add them to queen because they can kill her.
Hope she will be a good girl and make a great colony

[Skippy]

So I cannto to add worker with queen? ... hmm , dont know , I maybe will try it and study , no all workers at that one time , but slowly ... one ant , next day second and third ant ... etc , maybe it´ll be ok

fungus from a shop already on the way to me , so all is ok , also campo sericeus on the way (I still didnt pay and they sent me it )

Skippy