ANTSTORE World of Ants

[Messorus]

Hello all



Yestrday I received healty colony of Gnamptogenys species from one private keeper in Czech. This colony constains almost 30 workers and one queen. Their older keeper was breading them in 3dcl jar with humus and soil into of it.... Gnamptogenys made a system of tunels and holes in the soil, but I haven´t seen the ants very good. So I decided to move them.
I got them yestrday, at about 13.30 o´clock. I came home at 18.00 o´clock and I put the jar near other formicariums in our garage. I saw ants just minimaly,just some workers, but their colour and anatomy was incredible for look! At ten o´clock at the evening I put there a mosquito and in the morning there was no insect, so they grabbed it. But I saw one worker, quickly running underground....
Today, at 10.30 I happily moved them to new 0.5L jar.... I mixed lignocel(crushed palm wood) and clay garden soil and I made optimal soil for them. Than I started to removing soil from their old jar. After some minutes I caught first worker and I put it to the Petriho bowl with some humus. Than I was carefully removing their soil and I caught all workers and queen... I used just pinsete, a spoon and some other entomological tools. When I was capturing a worker, I putted the pinsete near him and I left him to walk on to pinsete, so I didn´t manipulated with the ants by my fingers or hands....
I made some photos, I will show them at the evening... Cheers

Cheers

[Kale^^]

Ohh, nice colony, I've never heard of those before!! They look pretty cool too. Good luck with these!

[JimmyVe]

They are in deed very nice ants. Good luck and i can't wait to see some pictures.

[Messorus]

Hello guys
I´m back with some photos from their moving to new home. Sorry, the quality is just medium or worse, but there you can see the head points of this interesting ants.

Worker

A queen is very similiar to worker, but she have larger abdomen and larger thorax, and she is about 0.5mm bigger than workers... My colony also have a larvaes, about 5... Like all Poneriane, these ants don´t have much brood and colonies usually are smaller too....
I gave them a giant mosquito, cause they love insect... They are just predating, Gnamptogenys never eat honey water. I believe they can, but I won´t do experiments.... Hyperlinks sind nur für registrierte Nutzer sichtbar - Giant mosquito

Their new jar:

..after the moving :

...what´s a funny gaster?!- Like Proceratium have :

And the best photo ever:

[SteveUK28]

Very very nice... keep us updated

[Messorus]

Guys ate the mosquito at the yestrdays evening..... I gived them the insect by pinsete, they was staring at my fingers and moving with antenas- they was trying to identificate my personal pheromon
I made the best photo of this species for now:

And what´s new? I thought, that workers made an room near hole which I´ve made down into the soil close the glass of the jar.... Yes, they dug somethink in this tunel, but I´ve found the colony under moss....

When I pick up the moss, I can see these nice ants very good- workers feeding the laraves, queen cleaning together with workers.... But I´m not picking it very offen, cause I don´t want to stress them...
On this picture you can see their gaster from above.....

[JimmyVe]

Really nice Messorus. Hope they do well so you can post a lot of info and pictures here.

[Messorus]

From yestrday there´s one died worker.. i think he was older, so don´t worry. When these ants die, they just stand on their position and stop moving.... When I got them, in the jar was one died worker. He was standing in the same position like this last died.... I think it´s normal, these workers was looking like older... I will take some pictures tomorow, cause in my room is too cold for these ants- 20°C... And taking of photos in garage..hm...

[Messorus]

I´ve made an video of Gnamptogenys

[Messorus]

Hello again. Yestrday´s evening they´ve got a middle size cricet and there was one old died worker... There are no larvaes under the moss, they moved them underground... Today I was looking for determination, I m sure that these ants are Gnamptogenys biroi... I will post link here later....

[Messorus]

Hello guys
Ants are doing very good. Each day, or each second day, I´m giving them insect like flyies, cricets or big mosquitos onto substrate and they take it by night activity than.... I´m controllign the nest also, by picking up the moss... They´ve made a room under the moss, but now there are few tunels oriented to down. I think, they dug a complex of rooms and tunels there, cause in the room under moss are just few workers, but queen or princess is there, too.
Their old keeper told me, that there was borned few young females, but any males. Beside the moving I saw there not just queen, but a caste of workers with differently thorax than queen, but also diferent than worker´s thorax... So I don´t know, any winged ants there.... I think that they´ve cut the wings of all young females....

I think, I can finally say that this species is Gnamptogenys biroi Hyperlinks sind nur für registrierte Nutzer sichtbar

When I will see new young workers(light orange chitin), I will make new formicary for this colony.... I´m thinking about set- up with some moss, forest humus and 2 small ytong nests, each one with 3 small rooms....


Cheers