ANTSTORE World of Ants

[miszt]

perfectly they are very timid the first workers, and wont forage during the day at all, even the slightest disturbance will send them back to the nest site

I have about 16 workers now, and I only see 1 or 2 about, except when i feed them, then max of 5 I've seen out feeding, the first year I had very little activity at all


dont worry about sticking honey into the nest, leave a small amount of honey sumwhere outside the nest, and they will find it if they need to, feed them tiny insects occasionally, they may not eat them, but keep giving them to them, every couple of days, so your queen gets nice and fat, and lays lots of eggs.

I have a huge pile of eggs now, but its taken around 24 months, i'm expecting around 60-100 workers by next year, and lots of activity ( i do have 2 queens in my colony however)

[badman]

Yeah I wouldn't bother force feeding them, it would only disturb them and you may end up with old honey in the tube which you cant clean out. The ants will come out if they need food and probably do anyway, they can get through tiny gaps or re-seal the tube easily.

[marc.tulley]

Hey matey , im gonna try your '2 queens in 1' trick.
Although with ligniperda, making a sweeet new nest so would love 2 queens churning out ants !
How do you reckon best to do it?
- 2 tubes in fridge to cool down
- connect together
- leave?

any help much appreciated
thanks

[tail__]

It is very hard, almost impossible with this species. They may be cautious for some time, but sooner or later they will start fighting. There Can Be Only One. The only exception sometimes is a VERY large nest (a few m^2!) with olygogyn colony - every queen controls her own district, although workers cooperate with each other. I don't know if anyone tried this in artificial nest.

[miszt]

The only reason I put two Camp herc queens together Marc, was because it is fairly well documented that they can be Polygyn, although as Tail said, eventually the Queens will start to fight, and inhabit seperate parts of the nest, mine are currently happy together. I have no idea wether Camp lig are ever Polygyn...not sure its worth the risk, without some research first

[marc.tulley]

kk i defo read that they are polygyn so i wanna give it a try.
Dont really matter if they end up at different ends of the nest as long as there both making ants

[badman]

the point is that if the queens become hostile the workers will also be hostile, or at least non-cooperative. You may as well keep them in seperate nests. Where did you read they are polygyn?

ligniperda breed quickly anyway, herculaneus are slow so I can understand wanting 2 queens

[miszt]

If you are going to attempt putting them together, cool them down for a few hours, then put them in the fridge for half an hour before putting them together, then leave them in the fridge for another half an hour, this will help reduce any aggression between then.....but be prepared, you may loose both colonies! how many workers do you have for each? if you have only 2-3, then there shouldnt be to much of a problem, if you have more, the risk increases allot

[marc.tulley]

id say ligniperda are just as slow.

I have 1 queen with worker and another queen on with only a view lava

there in the fridge as i type this , will let u know how it goes

[marc.tulley]

With a bit of 'encouragement , i got the ligni queen and here lavae into the other tube with a ligni queen and a worker.

after spending about an hour face2face and abdomen2abdomen inspecting each other they seem to be calming down a bit and are no longer pointing abdomens at each other. the worker also introduced himself and gathered both queens eggs/lavae into one pile too

Hope the non-agressive interaction continues!
Wish me luck !

[Kale^^]

2 queens in one colony sounds very cool, tho i'm not gonna use it (i don't want to have a colony too big too soon)

[badman]

Do herculaneus tend to eat insects where they find them and then pass the food onto the colony or will they drag food back to the nest?

I ask because a worker of mine has spent the last day dragging a cricket around in the feeding dish as if trying to take it away, but she's not able to get it over the steep sides, the cricket doesn't seem to have been eaten at all, no bits lying around. Whereas my other ligniperda colony simply disected the cricket and ate it where they found it. They took a leg back for the queen.

[miszt]

both, cut insects up for them at first if u only have a small colony, they are not so strong

[marc.tulley]

yeah seems to be randomly both with mine sometimes they will unsuccessfully try and drag a whole spider down the entrance, sometimes they disect and bring back the good bits or sometimes eat it there and then

[marc.tulley]

well me 2 ligniperda queens are gettin on fine
just hope they dont have a sudden change of heart