3 replies to this topic

[futurebird]

My Camponotus discolor colony is becoming the "escape artist" colony. They have two outworlds. A cork nest, a wood nest... and until today they had a 2nd wooden nest which I added a few days ago. They seemed to like it... but thinking back I think what they liked was that they found a soft spot in the wood where they could dig.

48 hours later I start seeing very small ants outside of the nest. The hole was very small and few could fit. I had to go to a doctor's appointment so they had about 3 hours to go nuts.

I think about 300 of them escaped? The nests didn't look any more empty. They were easy to track. They had all decided to form a satellite nest in my art supply drawer. They were in there in a big pile.

I have formic acid breath.

I have a headache from inhaling so much.

I'm glad my aspirator has a filter on it.

 

I was able to get everyone back into the main nest with a few hours of work. Then I cleared them out of the wooden nest so I could inspect it to find out exactly how it failed. It looks like it may have been a beetle bore, or a knot.

I still really like wooden nests, but my advice is to keep a CLOSE eye on them after you set them up. Hardwood will contain nearly all ants. But if there is a softwood flaw you could have problems.

 

Really that this has only happened once out of 6 wooden nests is impressive in its own way.

Also is there any cure for the raging wanderlust of this colony?

I'm thinking of giving them some softwood and putting it inside so they can dig and chew it and hopefully exhaust all their excess energy.

[ANTdrew]

The only cure really is to give them really big outworlds and very secure setups. Really big colonies with old workers become hell bent on exploring. I don’t know how much one can actually do about that beyond containing it.

[futurebird]

Colony size and species are factors in wander lust.

My Lasius neoniger ants have no desire to escape. I left one side of their nest uncapped for hours and only found two or three workers outside, the rest were busy trying to stop up the hole. 

My Pogonomyrmex colony wants back in as soon as they fall out. (and thank god, they would be a nightmare if they acted like the discolor colony)

My Camponotus Pennslyvanicus ants seem very happy with their current outworld and not that interested in exploring. 

I'm going to look for some soft wood, bake it to get it clean and see if they can amuse themselves making sawdust for a bit. 

[ANTdrew]

Knowing ants, they’ll probably chew up sawdust and paste it all over the glass like carton. That would be a good example of what I call Myrmy’s law.