85 replies to this topic

[TennesseeAnts]

Ah. Commercial use is illegal, but recreational use is legal. Govt. just wants more money. XD

[Ferox_Formicae]

Yup, but if you can ever get down to the Florida Keys, maybe you could get your hands on some of these beautiful ants! They're some of my favorites, and I would absolutely adore to have a colony of them, especially in the same encloser as one of my other favorite species!

[TennesseeAnts]

I wish you luck! When I take my family to Disney world, I will try to get to the keys.

[Ferox_Formicae]

I wish you luck! When I take my family to Disney world, I will try to get to the keys.

Well hopefully you find some! The do also live in peninsular Florida, but only in far southern regions. However, they're most commonly found in the Keys. Check AntMaps for reference.

[Ferox_Formicae]

Oh, and if you wanna learn more about these, there are some really good articles on AntWiki you could check out. Some of the most informative things can be found there, even things like how they were cared for under lab conditions!

[TennesseeAnts]

That is awesome! Definitely going to check that out once my computer gets fixed.

[123LordOfAnts123]

Wait, you imported a Cephalotes colony from Florida? Did you get a permit? Nice job on the formicarium by the way!

I have not yet gotten the colony, I will hopefully be getting them in June when I go to Florida, and I don't need a permit as it is apparently legal to bring ants across state borders depending on the species and whether or no they could survive in that state if released, which Cephalotes varians cannot.

It’s not legal, and that is not how the law works. A PPQ 526 permit is required for *any* ant - especially reproductives - to be moved across state lines.

Edited by 123LordOfAnts123, May 20 2019 - 12:52 PM.

[Ferox_Formicae]

 

 

Wait, you imported a Cephalotes colony from Florida? Did you get a permit? Nice job on the formicarium by the way!

I have not yet gotten the colony, I will hopefully be getting them in June when I go to Florida, and I don't need a permit as it is apparently legal to bring ants across state borders depending on the species and whether or no they could survive in that state if released, which Cephalotes varians cannot.

It’s not legal, and that is not how the law works. A PPQ 526 permit is required for *any* ant - especially reproductives - to be moved across state lines.

 

Thank you for clarifying. I will try and get a hold of a PPQ permit before I go to Florida in less than a month. I've already been looking into it.

[ANTdrew]

Your formicarium sounds really cool. I’d like to see photos when you’re done.

[Rstheant]

Your formicarium sounds really cool. I’d like to see photos when you’re done.

Same.

[Acutus]

Thank you for clarifying. I will try and get a hold of a PPQ permit before I go to Florida in less than a month. I've already been looking into it.

 

Let me know how that works! I'm thinking of getting a permit too. You may be asking a bit much though with less than a month to go considering this is a Non-native species and that it's the Federal govt, you're applying to. Good Luck!

[123LordOfAnts123]

Thank you for clarifying. I will try and get a hold of a PPQ permit before I go to Florida in less than a month. I've already been looking into it.

Let me know how that works! I'm thinking of getting a permit too. You may be asking a bit much though with less than a month to go considering this is a Non-native species and that it's the Federal govt, you're applying to. Good Luck!

No kidding. A response time of 2-3 months would be considered average.

Edited by 123LordOfAnts123, May 20 2019 - 7:40 PM.

[Ferox_Formicae]

I'm starting to get just a little concerned for this colony. There seem to be pieces of fungus scattered over the top of the soil in their holding container. They do seem to be tending to these pieces, but I don't know if they still have a garden under the soil somewhere or not. When I did collect the fungus, it completely fell apart, which I expected, but I'm hoping that they can put it back together. Only a few ants have died, probably less than 10, so I think their eating, but I'm not sure how long these ants can go without their fungus, but I think they still have it. I've given them a Sweet Gum leaf and some other plant materials to give to their fungus, and I'm going to collect some caterpillar frass for their fungus. I did find some frass in the lower fungus chamber when they were collected, so it seems to be something they feed it.

[Ferox_Formicae]

I almost killed my ants! Okay, so I was giving them a bit of water for their temporary holding enclosure, and I finally got to the point where I thought there was enough water. A few hours later, and I was checking on them, and I noticed the soil was sopping wet. I started digging, and there was about an inch of water at the bottom, flooding the entire thing! I quickly got to work digging for the queen and any fungus, which I wasn't even sure if there was any. I finally did find the fungus, but it was GREATLY reduced in size, from the size of my fist (and take into account there were two of them), to the size of my pinkie nail. I am glad that there is at least a little bit of fungus. I eventually found the queen, stuck in the water. I quickly scooped her out and placed her in a container on her own. I was relieved to hear her chirping, showing me that she was healthy. I quickly got to work preparing a new enclosure for them, on that was bigger with more digging space. I dumped the soil in with the ants and was relieved to see the fungus garden and some brood. I freed all of the workers and positioned a light over the enclosure to dry out the soil. I'm not out of the clear yet though. If the ants don't get their fungus underground before it dries, that'll be the end of the colony. I may as well ask just in case if anyone would be willing to send me replacement fungus? I could find a wild colony, but they're the only one I've found and I would prefer not to kill off a colony just to get mine some fungus. I think fungus from Acromyrmex or Atta would work fine, as I'm pretty sure they all farm the same species of fungus. The only Attine that I could not receive fungus from would be the fungus from Cyphomyrmex as they farm a form of yeast. I will keep you guys updated, and I hope and pray for these ants. It would kill me to see the colony die off.

[Ferox_Formicae]

I came up with a new formicarium design. Instead of a grout nest, I've decided to go all natural, and pretty much have a chunk of pine barrens in a 10 gallon tank, and it looks great! The soil mixture is really nice, and the plants look good too. The Trachies seem to love their new nest, and I'm pretty sure today would be the last time I will ever see the queen, and she's deep underground now. The formicarium also contains other species as well, my two Chinese Mantids, Ying and Yang, also inhabit the formicarium, not really bothering with the Trachies too much, although Ying did eat one. I also plan on raising springtails in it, along with maybe some other ant colonies, like maybe Pheidole bicarinata, as I found them in the same environment that the Trachymyrmex were in. Some bad news though, while transporting the Trachymyrmex to their new nest, I saw barely any fungus at all, in fact, I'm not even sure if what I saw was fungus. The good news, a few meters away from where I found the Trachymyrmex nest, I saw a few workers foraging, taking caterpillar frass to somewhere where I have not found yet. I'm going back to my park tonight, so maybe I can find this colony. Also, I'm wondering if it's possible to merge colonies, so I'm going to try an experiment in which I place a few of the wild workers in with my colony, and if they accept them, I will collect the second colony and gradually introduce the two together. If they do not accept the workers, I will only collect fungus from that colony. Something tells me that the colonies will accept each other, as the colonies seem to be in very close proximity most of the time.

[Ferox_Formicae]

I found the other colony! It was a lot harder to get to than the first colony, as it was beneath some very large roots. The nest was also very inconspicuous, and I was only able to find it by following one of the workers who was carrying a piece of frass. The colony is a lot smaller too, only containing about 40 workers, and the only fungus garden is very small, so I will not be giving any to my larger colony. I've given them a formicarium that is better for observation and that should work as a fungus garden, as the container is similar in size to a Trachymyrmex fungus garden, but smaller as this colony has a very small amount of fungus to farm. The good news is that the fungus seems to be very healthy, and not a single worker has died as of yet. I collected a bunch of frass to give to them and my other colony.

[TennesseeAnts]

Not fair.

[Ferox_Formicae]

Not fair.

Sorry.

[Ferox_Formicae]

The largest Trachymyrmex colony has been doing a lot of digging lately and seem to be making a mound. They have been very busy. I also gave them some rose petals to cut up, and they went right for them after about an hour. I did notice that most of the time, ants would nearly completely finish cutting a piece of rose petal, then just kind of give up and walk away. I did observe a few taking rose petal pieces back to the nest, however. This means they definitely have fungus! There have been a lot of ants dying though, and the dead pile consists of around 25 ants. The queen isn't in there though, thank goodness. I think they'll start doing better soon as they collect more and more material for their precious fungus and as the garden grows bigger. As the mound grows, I'll know they've constructed a fungus chamber, as the chambers are huge and a lot of soil will be brought out of the nest during the digging process. The smaller colony is doing well too. The colony has been working well with their fungus, and they seem to have a descent sized fungus ball, but I'm not sure if it's actually fungus or if it's just a clump of dirt, as it is in the tube which has a very distorted view. There do seem to be a lot of ants swarming around it though, along with the queen, so I'm pretty sure it's fungus. It'll eventually get larger if it is fungus, and the ants will have to move it into the container. When the fungus gets really big, it may actually fill up the entire container, and I plan on adding more chambers eventually. I also observed something cool among members of the colony. One individual will rear up a flip over on her back. The other will move in and start licking Actinomyces off of the first ant's Actinomyces patch. After several seconds of this, the licking individual will stop and back up while the Actinomyces giver rights herself and walks off. A very interesting behavior for sure. I also gave them some rose petals, but they have yet to touch them, as they seem to be very busy in the outworld, either searching for fungus that was left behind or getting substrate to build up a mound, as it does appear that a small mound is starting to appear, but they never had one in the wild.

[Ferox_Formicae]

The largest colony loves their roses! I placed some fresh rose petals into the nest, and after only a few minutes (I had yet to see any ants for about 20 minutes before), the ants began to pour out from the nest entrances and cut up the rose petals, actually finishing cutting this time! They seemed very interested in yesterdays petals more so than the new ones for some reason. I've still been seeing a bunch of ants moving dead ones, which makes me concerned. I think it's just because their fungus has shrunk so much and cannot support as many ants as it once could. It will soon recover though, and I will know it has when to colony has a large mound. The other colony is doing very well, and their fungus is growing. I've seen quite a few workers carrying around brood. They're also starting to take cut up rose petals into the nest for their fungus. They are becoming a little less photophobic and are pretty much all settled in. I suspect that the fungus will take up the entire nest box by early to mid fall. They will go through a period of slow fungus growth during the summer and the fungus will shrink, but it will spring back to life in the fall. If I'm lucky, they may even get alates next year!