925 replies to this topic

[Willow1218]

Hi these are nests that I make out of ytong and grout

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[Gregory2455]

Wow those look really  nice. 

[dspdrew]

Hi these are nests that I make out of ytong and grout

Not bad.

[Mercutia]

I've seen those on facebook! Teehee, I know who you are. -stalker-

[Willow1218]

Haha is that in a group?

[Mercutia]

Yeah. Mikey's fb group.

[Willow1218]

Yep that's me

[Gregory2455]

I thought recently to start experimenting with the styles ants dig their own colonies with. What I am thinking on doing, is for when I want to make a formicarium designed for a certain species, I move a small colony into a tuppaware filled with dirt, and let them dig for a few days. After I see they have progressed and I have a good model, I would stress the colony with factors such as temperature and light into moving out completely into another formicarium/test tube setup. Then, I cast the deserted nest with paraffin wax or some other material and wash the dirt out. With the model, I can then cast grout/ plaster nests, and carve AAC/ firebrick accordingly into shape to perfectly fit the natural nest style of that species. Anyone have any ideas to help improve this?

[Crystals]

It will be very hard to get them to leave the soil, even after it has dried out.  When dry tunnels can collapse.  You might find a group of wild workers and just let them dig until the day the last one passes away from old age.

Even just look at some of those aluminum ant nest castings, they you can see the pattern.  Parafin wax might break in the cleaning process, plaster of paris might be a better bet.  Or even better, use clay and simply let it dry out or kiln it.

[Gregory2455]

It will be very hard to get them to leave the soil, even after it has dried out.  When dry tunnels can collapse.  You might find a group of wild workers and just let them dig until the day the last one passes away from old age.

Even just look at some of those aluminum ant nest castings, they you can see the pattern.  Parafin wax might break in the cleaning process, plaster of paris might be a better bet.  Or even better, use clay and simply let it dry out or kiln it.

 

I just said paraffin because I have a lot of it condensed into blocks... The wild workers is a really good idea, or take a couple workers from a captive colony that is doing well.

[LAnt]

Do you really want to make a mold? I like the idea but couldn't you just eyeball a realistic looking mold?

[dermy]

Why eyeball it when you can get the ants to do the work for you? They are just workers, they get replaced by more workers, unless you don't like that idea....

[Mercutia]

I think that's a pretty interesting idea Gregory. Maybe you'll discover a new reason why ants build their nests a certain way that hasn't been noticed yet, etc. I'd imagine you'd be using a vertical "Uncle Milton" style to get the molding first?

 

By any means it is an interesting idea though I have doubts about it providing a more capable nest than a boring hand carved artificial one but I guess we won't really know until you try it.

[Gregory2455]

I'd imagine you'd be using a vertical "Uncle Milton" style to get the molding first?

 

Thanks for saying it is an OK idea, I plan on making my own nest for it. I am going to use a double pane glass, kind of like the formicarium of that sort I have, but smaller, and it would be able to open on the bottom, to be able to wash the dirt out faster.

[Tpro4]

Here's something I built this weekend that I plan to use for testing as my prototype for a whole series of completely customizable, interchangeable, and reusable, laboratory style formicaria I'm designing. I plan to make these as simple, compact, and uniform as possible, and with a hydration system that can last at least one month before needing to be refilled. I'm not going to explain much right now, but you can get the basic idea from these pictures. I will post more here and there as I go. Some of the design aspects shown in these pictures are not at all what the final design will be like, and even some that were meant to be in the final design, I have already changed my mind about. There will be Ytong, firebrick, or Hydrostone used, but the actual nest portion will mainly be made of acrylic, unlike this prototype. Also, unlike this one you see here, being that they are not designed for display, I am not planning to paint these either.
 

 

 

Where did you get this kind of box? this would be great to make a nest and outworld.

[Gregory2455]

The Container Store. The closest location to me and you is Pasadena I think.

[dspdrew]

Where did you get this kind of box? this would be great to make a nest and outworld.

They would be AWESOME to use for a nest and an out world.

 

You can find them at The Container Store.

[Tpro4]

where at?

[dspdrew]

http://lmgtfy.com/?q...Container Store

[Cypherf0x]

No ants right now so I'm biding time by designing some prototype formicariums.

 

First is an initial prototype of a modular formicarium.  The little tab indents you see on the side can be used to connect two of them together and the slots on the top are for doors to block or allow access.  It's 180mm x 180mm designed to be made of laser cut acrylic.  The idea is to minimize the need to undo tubes and possibly get stung or bitten and to grow with modules as needed.

 

 

I've seen some crazy tube configurations with tubes going through tubes to split them.  This hub is made for SLS 3d printing with an acrylic top for 5/8" tubing.

 

 

I'm not intending to sell anything.  The parts are CC-Attribution-ShareAlike international licensed.  You could make them and sell them yourself.  Everything is open design.

 

https://github.com/cypherf0x/Antlab