ANTSTORE World of Ants

[Daztroyer25]

Hey darradar and ashton nice to meet you both

I have ordered Some wax worms, as they have seem to gone off the mealworms, and will go to Health shop to grab some hazel nuts lol.

Unlike you ashton i think i have overfeed my colony as seemed to have lost interest, i have offered them minced meat which they normally take down to the eggs and nest, but last few days just seem happy to live down in the nest ( no fun )
I have about 30 - 50 ants out more interested in just mantenance work than feeding.
I think it is best to give these ants a more varied diet and agree with darradar that protein foods are what these ants are mostly interested in.

Does anyone know if it is normal to have more Eggs than ants?

[miszt]

you cant force your ants to eat, when they need food, they will forage if they dont, they will stay in the nest

[Ashton McStansfieldio]

Heya Daz, Miszt, funny you should say that, I came home today and for the first time ever there were no ants at all in the foraging area.

I hastily removed the cover on the glass front of the nesting area expecting some kind of trajedy or mass break out but there they all were tending what looked like an expanding brood:) and I did feed 2 large crickets yesterday so it seems to me you are right.

Worker death rate seems to have been reduced at last although I`ve been messing with too many variables to know which was the decisive factor....

[JimmyVe]

In my experience they do not eat from the honey ore sugar/water. They just don't like it.

It could be that you have more eggs than workers, that is a good sine, it means you going to have a big baby boom soon.

These ants are very sensitive to a lot of things, make sure to keep them at a good temperature and a good humidity.

[Daztroyer25]

Thanks Jimmy
I feed two large waxworms yesterday and they loved the change in pace, i would estimate about 300 workers (with soldiers) rushed out at a rate of knots.
Wax morms riggle alot so lots of ants doing commando rolls.
For about 2 months now i have had more eggs than workers, reason most probably due to fact that i have 3 queens, which i have had now for about 7 months.

Could anyone tell me if there is a way to work out the death rate of a colony? e.g per 500 ants = 5 ant deaths a day ? etc etc

Thank you all

[Necturus]

Hellooo everybody,
foraging is a good pointer for how hungry they are. Small colonies stay inside the nest for most of the time when satisfied, bigger colonies tend to always have some foraging going on - they get VERY hungry, and probably just will grab anything they can
As for death rates: I couldnt figure a "healthy" rate yet. Jimmy impressed me by having near zero losses in the first time, i didnt have that luck, but admittetly had some problems getting the right ammount of nest moisture. The workers are definitelyquite shortlived, and the "cemetry" does need regular cleening to avoid the attraction of parasites. I found that the arena substrate is best kept a bit moist, seemed to reduce the rate at which they perish and avoid the phenomenon of them biting off each others gaster.
How many "soldiers" in what sizes does your colony have? While workers are shortlived, soldiers live a lot longer. In nature, i would assume them to be the most obvious prey to any predator available, in captivity, theyr number keeps rising. Especially major worker seem to need a lot of ressources and time beeing tended to. If you feel they pile up to an much, reducing theyre numbers is a good way to give the workers time to tend the important next generation. Too much of an imbalance between workers and queens, males and soldiers killed quite a few colonies already , so constant observation seems a good idea. Never give them a chance to dig in anywhere, they pile up substrate even on the surface to make chambers. I learned the hard way, and my colony shrunk down to a few % of the former size.
You could try taking a picture of the full colony. Most of the time workers are almost invisible if the distance it too big, so it gets a bit tricky. To avoid to much of a reflection on the glas, use semitransparent paper in front of the flash.
This is my colony as of two weeks ago:


Part of the brood is in the depth of the field. I assume it was around 300-600 workers around that time. i gave up trying to estimates their numbers a long time ago

@Ashton: good to hear that the ammount of brood is growing! Now if your workers stay alive till the first of the new offspring hatch, your on a good way up. how many of them are there?

Also, i gave the lenses another try:

I was like when i saw the result on the computer screen.
Hope you didnt mind me throwing in the pictures,
Greetings,
Necturus

[darradar]

Hope you didnt mind me throwing in the pictures,

are you seriouse, they are totally phenominal..... thanks for sharing, lets see some more..

[Necturus]

Hey,
thanks - pictures are from my report
Greetings,
Necturus

[Ashton McStansfieldio]

Cool pics Necturus I have trouble with the small area of focus too, expect you would need as SLR camera with expensive macro lens to do much better though
Here is my colony as it stands as of today
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and a closeup of the same pic
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will also post on my diary page so you can compare to the shots from last time:)

would like to reduce the brightness of the flash but when i put things infront of it smoke comes out of it:/

[4mykids]

Great shots guy's!!!

[darradar]

wow makes me wanna keep this species, but with my colony and my tarants, i just dont have the room..... hmm or do i...............

[JimmyVe]

@darradar: that is how i started, i always thought i had no more room, i started of with 2 species, now i have about 20 and still the same space to keep them. lol

@Necturus: in deed the first colony i had started off with a zero dead count (the first days/week), the colony i have now is not doing that brilliant, but nothing to worry about.
I like you pictures very much ! Nice colony. Great picture of the queen, i'm still wondering what the 3 dots on the queens head are. I know every queen of this species have them but i'm don't know why, is there a explanation?

@Ashton McStansfieldio: looks like you colony is doing great to. Lot of brood. Nice pictures to.

[Necturus]

They are so called "simply eyes". Those "eyes" are for light detection only. Search for "simply eyes" or "ocelli" for more information.

@asthon: looks very healthy indeed!

Greetings,
Necturus