26 replies to this topic

[Domagoj]

 

Lids are generally a good idea to keep pets/kids/other animals out of your formicarium, and to keep flying alates in.

 

 

 

That's another question I had. What do you guys do when alates start emerging? do you try to curb it to prevent your hoses being flooded with ants, do you allow them to fly outside?

Also, how long does it usually take for a new colony to start producing alates?

 

In any case, here's a picture of queens E's brood. Mommy photobombing.

 

I'm eyeballing about 30-40 eggs.

Which brings me to another question. When should I start providing protein? I caught this queen on Monday two weeks ago and first noticed eggs a week ago (last Monday), so larvae could be hatching any day now, depending on when exactly they were laid. Should I leave it to the queen to feed the larvae off of her reserves or should I find some bugs?

The test tubes have been sitting at around 25-27 °C.

[Antkid12]

You can feed some now, although you don't have to until she gets her first workers. 

[Domagoj]

Ok, I'll look into getting some small soft critters. I ordered some freeze dried mealworms, bloodworms and Chironomidae larvae. Hopefully they'll like those, since I'd much prefer to be able to give them freeze dried stuff since if I started rearing worms, I suspect my family would either feed me those worms, or feed me to those worms. (I was getting weird looks when I mentioned the ants, and they are considered clean and somewhat cute; worms, maggots etc. not so much. In any case it's gonna take some time for those things to arrive. In the meantime I suppose I could have some boiled eggs for dinner, and give the queens a bite of those? This topic says L. niger likes those, and I suppose if my queens are not niger but emarginatus, that should make very little difference, right?

[Domagoj]

Did some more work on the terrarium. No ants for now and probably not for months to come, but I'd like to see if I can establish a healthy environment.

I went to a local woods and got some topsoil. I didn't remove the plant matter. I hope there are some microfauna in there to take care of the natural cycle. I mixed in some sand (about 15% by volume) which I baked to sterilizes in the oven for about three hours at 150°C (300°F) since I wasn't sure if it had any unwanted creepy crawlies.

Anyway, about 4 cm (1 1/2' in) of rocks for drainage:

 

Then a plastic mosquito mesh (two layers actually) and about 10 cm (4 in) of soil.

I also put in a couple of large rocks, maybe ant will like them. If not a bit of diversity will look nice.

 

I also put in a piece of wood that started to rot. Perhaps some bugs are in there too.

A bit of some kind of moss to make it green and this first stage is done. I still need to find more plants to beautify it, but I hope this will be enough to kickstart the natural cycle.

In my garden I have one or two pot plants that have some springtails (I think they are springtails) so I'll be adding those in as well as they emerge (there are only a few).

Fingers crossed and maybe by spring it will be ready to accept ants.

[RushmoreAnts]

 

That's another question I had. What do you guys do when alates start emerging? do you try to curb it to prevent your hoses being flooded with ants, do you allow them to fly outside?

Also, how long does it usually take for a new colony to start producing alates?

 

Alates won't come until the colony has at least a thousand workers, which would probably be when they're around 2-3 years old. And if you don't want them flying everywhere, then you just keep their enclosure shut and they'll be fine. And their first alate season probably will only consist of a few males. They'll have to be huge in order to produce queens. A colony of 5,000 plus may produce the swarms of alates you're thinking of, but they just won't' fly en masse without proper conditions, and couldn't escape their enclosure if it's closed, anyways. 

[Domagoj]

Oh cool. I was worried I'd have to anticipate it an take the enclosure outside to let them fly.

[RushmoreAnts]

Oh cool. I was worried I'd have to anticipate it an take the enclosure outside to let them fly.

Yeah, the males will always die and be eaten, and the queens will either die or drop their wings and act as workers.