5 replies to this topic

[Vendayn]

I'm going to get TONS of queens. My parents like stormchasing, and I guess there is huge thunderstorms where the Acromyrmex are. Still might move, but I can always give away and sell any queens/colonies I end up with. And since my birthday is in August, that is the only thing I asked for for my birthday.

 

I'm going to try various things with them.

 

I'll put queens together (most I'll probably put together is four or five). As, I've seen Atta queens nest together. Though, they'll kill each other until there is only one left I imagine after they get workers (like Atta do). All the queens I put together will go into test tubes (so that might be only thing I use test tubes for), as I do NOT want them to seperate and end up as individual colonies inside a single container. I think this might work out really well, as it works with Atta. It would give them a WAY higher chance of successful fungus and extra eggs/workers to start out with.

 

Various housing arrangements (test tubes as mentioned, containers with substrate, containers without substrate...lots and lots of different variety of containers. Even containers with only wood because hey, why not.)

 

My custom ant farm I made for the Acromyrmex queen I got a while back (she didn't make it)...but I'll only have one custom ant farm as they take a lot of room and time to make. So, one queen gets the "best" ant farm.

 

And lots of pictures. Even if they are my bad phone camera pictures lol. It takes "okay" (I guess) pictures of bigger ants, so it might work better than my small ants I currently have.

Edited by Vendayn, May 19 2015 - 2:12 PM.

[dspdrew]

You shouldn't have too much trouble finding them if you go to the right places. There seems to be different colonies flying after every storm that goes through, and it seems to continue all through the summer.

[Vendayn]

Would you say August is the best time to find them? I see they start their flights in July and end in September according to mating chart...so I figure that probably be my best chances. Though, it probably depends more on the storms than anything else. As you said, they mostly fly after the storms. And that just have to be something to keep an eye on. I'd probably only be able to go one day (so, just one chance), as that is a really far drive for my parent's already old car.

 

Hopefully storms are good this year. Sometimes the local thunderstorms don't really do much. I mostly just want the Acromyrmex. But stormchasing is fun too.

Edited by Vendayn, May 19 2015 - 3:31 PM.

[dspdrew]

I have only seen them fly the day after it rains, so you wouldn't want to just go any time; it needs to be right after a storm. Also, you have to catch them pretty quickly after they fly, or they probably won't be carrying their fungus anymore. When I brought mine home, most of them dropped their fungus a day later if I remember right. My journal has the details if you want them.

[cpman]

From trying Atta texana last year, I can say that you need to be careful with temperature.
Mine struggled to grow their fungus, even in my 4-queened setup.

Also, At. texana, like Ac. versicolor does found colonies cooperatively. However, they are the only leafcutter that has polygynous colonies that result from multiqueen founding.

[dspdrew]

I've been keeping my Acromyrmex versicolor in temperatures between 70F and 90F, and haven't had any noticeable problems with their fungus growing.