ANTSTORE World of Ants

[amrik singh]

For many years now I observed ants outside and in formicarium and take notes so I am going to give on this site the most interestings observations. my favorit ants are the Myrmicas , specialy Myrmica rubra and many other Myrmicinae .

[Messorus]

I think it will be ok, if it will have distincion of experienced amateur myrmecologiest
Good luck with you texts

[amrik singh]

The different species of Myrmicas the most common in Europe may be separate in two groups very different by the behaviour and the ecology : - Myrmica rubra and M. ruginodis who are territorial , dominent and relatively agressives .They need mutch humidity and a moderate temperatur .
- Myrmica scabrinodis and M. sabuleti who are slower, non territorial ,and generaly little agressive sub dominents. These , espacially M.sabuleti ,are adaptated to much warmer and dryer conditions.(To those we can add M. rugulosa that is competely submissive living on the territory of Lasius niger and other dominent ants.) These ants have a specialise predatory behaviour for feeding on workers of yellow ants Lasius flavus and Lasius umbratus when opportunity occure.

[amrik singh]

Myrmica rubra
Like all other ants (exept Prenolepis imparis recently establish in Europe)M. rubra need some warm temperature but moderately and have a great need of humidity in the nest even if it can forrage in dryer places. It can live in dry area if it find a wet depression or river bank to nest. The summer nests are superficials and in wet ground and so are vulnerable to trampeling by poeple or hooft grassing animals
that's why M.rubra is the dominent ant only in wet, stony area (nest protected by stone)or grasse area cut by rabbits and hare and some gardens without mutch passing of poeple or large grasseaters .In those places M. rubra is very dominent and abondant .M.rubra exploit aphids but protect them less than the Lasius does.
The succes of a M. rubra colony depend on the exploitation of a hunting grounds rich in relatively soft body preys and dead insects: Dence bushes (where they hunt moskitos,very small dipteres , small caterpilars,) thick grass , wet ground where they hunt springtails and so on. The hereditary competitor and ennemy of M.rubra is Lasius niger.When the conditions are OK M.rubra dominate and displace L.niger because of its superiority in combat both individually and collectively.
Myrmica rubra ajust to changes in local conditions by easy and often frequent emigrations.

[amrik singh]

Nest and territory of Myrmica rubra.

Been a territorial dominent ant its nest do not have a deffensive role :entrances and gallerys are larges and
the chambers spacious they can also use preexisting cavitys under a stone a dead branches or temporarely objets left on the ground ,specialy in the sun, where they bring the nymphs : Inside a Iron tube table leg , under metal backet or a piece of cardboard ...
The nest is organise as follow :A few openings , under these a gallery and room that contain workers old enough to forrage and to deffend the colony, innactives and ready to be recruted .After come other gallery and rooms containing the larvas eggs and qween(s) the nymphes are placed in separate piles generaly in the warmest part of the nest or nearby cavity.
The nest is usualy occupy only in part . When the ground is soften by the rain these ants escavate more than necessary and so capture a number of preys in theyr gallery (in spring , when the larvae are small it can give them enough food so few foragers are seen on the surface before june).
The alert chamber contain around 50 workers for a colony of 250 or 300 workers bigger colonys more.
but big collonys can have mores of these allert rooms and somes can be situated some distanse from the main nest and be used to recrute near food sourses or for deffense but the preys are taken directly to the main nest to the larva chambers.
It is said often that ants have no leaders .In reality the oldest workers initiates most activity as scouts-leaders, recruting to new hunting grounds rich in preys and patroling the surface of the nest and aroud ...
Most workers hunt on one or two hunting grounds at a time of usuly half to one square meter sometime several meters from the nest, following a way marked with a pherhormone produced by a stinger gland.
M. rubra hunt collectively large preys only at less than 10 cm from these allert rooms.
- Artificial nest.
As we see M.rubra like it verry humid ,near saturation and because it make large rooms pure sand is not good at all.
The problem with an antfarm(I speak by experience)is that M.rubra like so much to escavate wet ,soft ground that you find yourself quickly with a large empty space between the windows ,to dry , without
cloison and crumbling roof : Unhabitable.
Plaster nest is ideal but be aware that most plasters on sale contain poison so better to buy readymade
nests or plaster from Antstore.
Better not to have to big a nest because the ants throw garbidge in the unoccupy part of the nest making it unhealty for future occupation and during hibernation the colony occupy less space than during the active period .An other bigger nest can be given when the colony outgrow the previous one. The emigration from
one nest to the other is one of the most spectacular and interesting spectacle that this ants have to offer.
The itong nest is fine but small cavitys must be close by coating the nest with loam or plaster otherwise
eggs ,food leftover... cannot be removed and become a source of mold and infection.
When the density of ants in the arena is high they behave as it is the surface of theyr nest: more agressively.

[amrik singh]

To observe any ant in the conditions the closest to natur it is better to have as large an arena(s) as possible.
The cheapest and easy ways to have a succesfull colony of Myrmica rubra is to use a glass bassin ,better with drilling (available from Antstore),The rest depend on what you want to see: If you want to give a natural setting without seeing inside the nest you can put loam mix with thin flat stone on it reposing on blocks make of plaster or peaces of stone to prevent the stone from crushing the ants when they have removed the loam from under .You can put an other flat stone at the top also on blocks.the loam aroundmust be cover at the surface with some vegetal earth for the plants .The plants must be small like daisi or moss or stay-small variety of grass .The edge of the bassin must be cover with fluon (from antstore) on least 3cm to prevent escape.If you can't spray water(demineralised water) on the plants at least once a day you must put a lid .Mosses are very easy because they need little light.
To see or at least to know what is inside the nest an other setting is necessary :A plaster nest or cheaper
test tubes cover with red transparen foil .The test tubes must be filled half with water cover with a tight plug of cotton wool .The nest entrance plug must be pearced so the queens can pass easily.New tubes must be added when the colony grow or when the water left is not enough.The tubes must be secured to prevent from moving . Plaster nests must be connected to any sort of arena by tube. No wet ground must be present or ants will hide in it.

[amrik singh]

It must be noted that in northern central Europe the ant population on shady slopes exposed to the north is very low ,even the Myrmicas need a minimum of warmt so the nests are situated in places that receave a bit of sun at least part of the day exept during warm spels when they can move to the shade.
Behind windows the sun is much to hot so the formicarium must NEVER receave direct sun. Better the temperatur stay between 22° and 25°c more than 30 is probably very bad, less than 18 the activity slow down much and less than 15 the Myrmicas r. seems to enter or prepare to enter into hibernation.
We must realise than in natural conditions when it is to hot or to cold the ants can go dieper in the ground
where they find the right temperatur. In artificial nest they are much more exposed to chages in air temperatur.
The hibernation is preprogramed and necessary even if the temperature stay at 15° c but in that case one or two workers continue to come to the honey or sugar water .

[amrik singh]

Myrmica rubra food .
The success of M. rubra is based mainly on its capacity to take by force from the Lasius and to keep the best hunting grounds rich in small soft (or not to hard )preys plus diverses concentrations of food : Dead insects ,aphides(plant bugs producing a sugar rich excretion ),tree sap flow, fruits... The sugars help to feed the adults and keep them active but are not very important ,animal food is what count.
Springtails, moskitos, very small flyes, small moths, soft insects larvas (small caterpilars, magots , soft beetel larvas and nymphes ),spiders killed in their underground den, dead or dieing flyes and spiders very small worms 2 to 3 cm maximum more rarely until 8cm long ,occasionely Formicinae brood .
The Myrmica rubra are never interested to eat beetels ,mealworms ,bees or wasps (exept if the colony is starving) simply because they have great difficulty getting into the taff exoskeleton so the ennergy spend make these food uninteresting these may never be given as food exept cut in peeces to give easy acces to the inside. They do not like neighder drye food, living in wet places they seems rarely if ever to humidify dryfood to consume it . Snails and slugs are never eaten by ants in Europe exept by those of the Formica rufa group. Wild colony of M.r takes cook rise grains but I will not recomend it because it is messy and rot in the nest.
Honey water, sugar water , fruits may be given only as a supplement not as a main food.
Killed insects and spiders can be suplemmented by small living insects and larvas placed in a close plastic box pearced so that ants can enter it. Domestic krickets and maggots buy from a reptil shop are best but some diversity is a good thing.

[bensingleton92]

this is realy good thanks so is it best not to keep m.rubra in a upright ant farm.

[amrik singh]

Indeed but I think M.scabrinodis and M. sabuleti who make narrower gallery and smaller chambers and
nest often in dryer conditions will be OK in a antfarm.

[Messorus]

Yes yes, nice texts... Some informations are knowly for me, did´t you wokr with books of B. Seifert? But also nice inteligent texts, thank you much!

[amrik singh]

Hello,
No the only informations a bit detailled that I did get about the Myrmicas came from old numbers of
"Insectes Sociaux " and from the book of A. Raigné , newer books give some small informations about the
Myrmicas (some also mistakes) probably because they are difficult to observe in the grass and bushes where they live and because keeping in artificial nests give the false impression that we know nearly everything about them. I did not know the book of B. Seifert but if it is translate in English I will try to get it.

[amrik singh]

Hi,
After nearly two months (I realy did not find the time) I will continue to write what i observed about Myrmica rubra, M. ruginodis ,M. sabuleti ,M. scabrinodis specialy when competing with other ants .

[amrik singh]

Myrmica rubra need hunting ground ritch in soft body preys small enough for one ant to kill but can catch collectively bigger soft body preys near the entrance of theyr nest or retreave these preys dead or dying.
the collection of sugars from aphids ,flowers ... is just a usefull supplement. The Lasius exployte the aphids as theyr main reliable food source and are the dominent ant in divers microclimate if there is a minimum
of direct sun and so is also the pionneer specie in disturbed habitats. So the succes of Myrmica rubra depend of it's capasity to invade and keep the hunting territory occupy by L. niger .The Formicas replacent the Lassius later, after many years without major disturbance. So I am going to describe how Myrmica rubra fight of succesfully Lasius niger and invade theyr territory to become the dominent ant in many area.

[amrik singh]

In central europe after the destruction of all or most ant nest in a grass area the largest number of founding queens who land and succede to start a colony are those of Lasius niger,some Lasius flavius a few of Tetramoriums and Myrmicas scrabrinodis or M.sabuleti: L.flavius been entirely subteranean avoid competing much with L.niger ,the Tetramoriums are resistants and dominent on theyr small territory,M.sc. and M.sa. are non territorial and subdominent as long as they are outnumbered by L.n and theyr narrow gallerys make easy the deffence of theyr nest .
Most of the Myrmicas rubra queens who escavate a nest or the new born colonys are destroyed very agressively by L.n who vastly outnumber them :The Lasius are economicaly more efficiant and the queen much more prolific so theyr colony grow mutch faster. So Myrmicas rubra queen succed to establish a colony only rarely when they find a space unoccupy for exemple in the shade. From there the colony grow until it have several hundred workers ,at that stage it can resist and even go on the offessive.
In a individual encounters, when a Myrmica rubra or M.ruginodis fight with a Lasius niger the combat is very short ,violent and deadly ,the ants rolling on the ground ,the Myrmica grip the Lasius to sting it wile biting the thorax or the neck ,the Lasius niger try to keep loose (without success) wile spraying formic acid/poison, after a few segonds it is over. Out of five individual encounters 4 finish with the dead of the Lasius, 1 with the dead of both ants ( score 5 to 1).
So if the L .n . do not vastly outnumber M.r ,it have no chance of winning but it is mostly by fighting collectively that M.r. .have the edge. I will describe the combats I observed later.