ANTSTORE World of Ants

[JimmyVe]

If there are no more workers dying it could be that they where just stressed out. Good luck with your colony and keep us up to date.

[Peenmeister]

It seems as if in the last week, nothing much has changed. I put a little more soil in to cover the locations where some ants seems to have trouble walking over because of the cork granules. Some ocasionally still die, but two nests are still inhabited and seem lively, although I've spotted little activity around them.
I also spotted some new males and have seen my queen out of it's nest two times in the last weeks, so at least she's still alive.
I used to provide them with water in dishes, but so many drowned in it that i decided not to use them anymore and just spray moisture on the leaves of plants so they can drink from that.
I do feed them suger and honeywater on glass strips every other day, but not many seem interested anymore. They do however eat the dried insects I feed them.

[JimmyVe]

You can give them water in the dishes but put some cotton in it. (they can lick the water of the moist cotton) That way they can not drown.

It is normal some workers die, if the colony is bigger more will die of aging, as long if there are not to much dying at the same time.

[Peenmeister]

Thanks for the tip, silly I didn't think of that.

[JimmyVe]

It's to hard to know everything. Good luck.

[SNiDE]

How is your colony doing Peenmeister? I recently got this species too (friday), without a doubt the best species I've collected so far. Had similar issues with ants not wanting to drink honeywater, I've put loads of antstore honey solution in, just incase they didnt like my honey, I've put it in petri dishes, on flat plastic, on cotton wool, even just on the sand or moss, yet I've only seen one or two ants eating it. Lots of ants drinking condensation though, and they are munching through 2 crickets a day. Going to try your glass strips idea for feeding them honey now!

[Peenmeister]

My colony is not doing well. Today, for the first time in this week, I see a few ants crawling around the tank and surprisingly, the Queen as well. She sits high on a plant, seemingly waiting for me to spray water. Seems she has adbandoned the nest. THink i will catch her and a few workers and put her in a smaller tub.

[Peenmeister]

I have now isolated all the living ants (probably less than 10 now) of which at least two are queens. I did this by using glass strips to allow the ants to only use part of the basin, a part with a big branch in the middle, directly under the heatlamp. I moved the two nests (the original adbandoned nest) and the new nest, which still has some activity, onto the branch. I hope this last rescue attempt will work but I really doubt it.

[donbilbo]

So you had 400 ants and only 10 survived?

[Peenmeister]

Sad but true.... It might still be around 20, since I cannot really see inside the new nest. Somehow, after the first week, the ants stopt foraging and slowly started dying. The ants that remain do seem to be hard at work protecting the queen and feeding her. However, they still dont drink much, only when I spray them.
It seems as if something in the setup is going wrong, can't seem to figure out what it is. Anyway, thx for all your support on this forum. I might try a new colony after I find out whats going wrong with this one. Maybe the nest will still produce some new brood, who knows. The queens are both still healthy so I really can't think of any reasons the workers are in trouble.

[SNiDE]

Goodluck peenmeister with your ants, hopefully the colony is recoverable!