ANTSTORE World of Ants

[KiamCameron]

grass seeds

[Andrew]

okay thankx, when do major workers begin to appear?

[KiamCameron]

depends mostly when the colony has like 100 workers or so im still waiting for mine see some big workers but no majors

[Andrew]

okay, i have been taking a few larvae from a wild harvester nest and they accept them.

[Andrew]

Do Western Harvester eat dandelion seeds?

[mpir]

Sure, why not? It won't kill them if you try giving it to them.

[Andrew]

They loved it. I set seed in the foraging tank and they picked up the seeds with the fluff. But they had trouble moving the seeds down the tube because the fluff wouldn't fit through some of the small tunnels, so they figured out to bite the seeds from the fluff. I am so proud of them. Now some larger workers are coming out and getting bigger seeds. I am excited.

[Andrew]

I have read somewhere that when you have a queen in a tube, you could use red saran wrap, but i read that some southern united state species can see through it, but then black wrap keeps them dark, but u can't see anything. my question is if western harvester or messor barbarus can see through red saran wrap?

[mpir]

I don't really know much about "western harvester ant" but I can say that in general that new Messor queens have no problem adapting to light. I've kept my queen in the dark while she was starting a colony and never bothered her. But once she had a first worker I gradually unwraped the tube and never used any foil afterwards. The colony does not have any problems and it for sure does not slow down their development.