ANTSTORE World of Ants

[Sniengan Doo]

Well, the Lasius niger ants I got from Antstore are still doing ok.

The queen has been blocked into her test tube by the workers, she is happy about this and has laid a large number of eggs (20+).

I dont know why, but even though the test tube is at a 45 degree angle in the basin (laid on a small bottle to keep it at 45 degrees), the area where the queen is keeps flooding.

It gets very humid judging by the condensation, I have so far removed nearly 2 mls of liquid over the past 2 weeks from the brood chamber its self. In fact the workers today even moved out all or most of the eggs into the mouth of the test tube so its causing them a lot of concern as well.

There is a reservoir of water below the cotton wool plug that the queen is on, that came with the queen. Its nearly 2-3cms away from where she is. I am assuming that the honey water is acting as a humectant? I am not feeding the ants at all, but the workers do have access outside their test tube to this.

The basin containing the queen and her workers is coming home with me this weekend for hibernation.

How can I stop further flooding, Im gonna be devastated if they drown in error?


Mary

[JimmyVe]

Hi Mary,

You get condensation if the temperature inside the tube is higher than outside. (but i think you already know that ) So the best way to prevent this is to put the tube at a warmer place.
But there is your problem, they need to hibernate so they need to be between 0-10°c to do this.
The best way to solve this (i think) is to put them in a new tube, if you put to little cotton between the water and the ants you have much more change of condensation to so try to make one with a bit more cotton. (if you understand what i mean)

Hope they will be fine.