17 replies to this topic

[Canadian anter]

Order Policy

Unless I am otherwise able to accommodate, ALL orders ship on the next Monday following the date at which the payment is 

made.Typically anything warmer than -5 Celsius is fine for live ants.

Winter Shipping: For 5$, we will add a 60-hour heat pack and extra insulation. 

 

 

Live Guarantee

Any shipments that are a total or partial loss can be reshipped or a refund of the ants (minus shipping) may be given.  It is up to you. However, this Live guarantee is only offered for ants when

 

A. a shipping option faster than 3 days is chosen

B. if temperatures are below -5C, a winter shipping option should be chosen

 

We currently ship exclusively with Canada Post. For the orders via the website, rates are calculated during the checkout process and prior to payment. Orders via formiculture, Kijiji, or other platforms will be biilled independently. If you're curious about shipping costs and options, add some things to your basket to initiate checkout.

 

Please note: Local pickup is available at a designated location in the Richmond hill area, and a premium will be charged for delivery

 

Website: canada-ant-colony.com

Instagram: @canada_ant_colony

Twitter: @canadant_colony

Facebook Page: Canada Colony

 

 

-> Ant Queens and Colonies

 

-> Formicaria & Antkeeping Supplies

 

->Termites and Termitaria

Edited by Canadian anter, November 9 2019 - 9:38 PM.

[Canadian anter]

 
Aphaenogaster picea

 

Single Queen - 25$ - 4 available

Queen + 1-5 workers - 35$ - 2 available

Queen + 10-25 workers - 75$ - 1 available

Queen + 25-50 workers - 90$ - 1 available

 
Aphaenogaster tennesseenis

 

Queen + 1-5 host workers - 120$ - 2 available

 

 

Brachymyrmex depilis

 

Single Queen - 15$ - 5 available

 

 
Camponotus herculeanus

 

Single Queen - 15$ - 4 available

Queen + 5-10 workers - 35$ - 2 available

Queen + 10-25 workers - 60$ - 1 available

 
Camponotus nearcticus

Sold out

 

Camponotus novaeborecensis

 

Single Queen - 15$ - 20 available

Queen + 1-5 workers - 25$ - 3 available

Queen + 5-10 workers - 35$ - 2 available

Queen + 10-25 workers - 60$ - 1 available

 

 

 
Camponotus pennsylvanicus

 

 

Single Queen - 20$ - 5 available

Queen + 1-5 workers - 30$ - 3 available

Queen + 5-10 workers - 40$ - 2 available

Queen + 10-25 workers - 70$ - 1 available

 

 

 
Crematogaster cerasi

 

Single Queen - 20$ - 10 available

 

 

 

 
Crematogaster lineolata

 

Single Queen - 20$ - 10 available

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by Canadian anter, November 9 2019 - 9:02 PM.

[Canadian anter]

Formica aserva

Sold Out

 

 

Formica bradleyi

 

Queen + 1-5 workers - 60$ - 1 available

Queen + 5-10 workers - 75$ - 3 available

 

 

Formica exsectoides

Sold Out

 

Formica incerta

Sold Out

 

Formica montana

 

Single Queen - 25$ - 3 available

Formica neogagates

Sold Out

 

Formica neoclara

Sold Out

 

Formica neorufibarbis

 

Queen + 1-5 workers - 35$ - 3 available

Formica pacifica

 

Single Queen - 25$ - 10 available

Formica pallidefulva

Sold Out

 

Black Formica spp

Single Queen - 10$ - 4 available

Queen + 5-10 workers - 30$ - 1 available

 

 

 

Formica ulkei

Sold Out

Lasius americanus

 

Single Macrogyne - 10$ - 2 available

Microgyne Trio -  25$ - 12 available

Queen + 1-5 workers - 15$ - 10 available

Queen + 5-10 workers - 25$ - 10 available

Queen + 10-25 workers - 40$ - 15 available

 

Lasius aphidcolus

 

Queen + 5-10 host workers - 30$ - 16 available

Lasius brevicornis/nearcticus

 

Single Queen - 17$ - 72 available

Lasius claviger

 

Single Queen - 10$ - 10 available

Queen + 5-10 hosts - 20$ - 12 available

 

 

Edited by Canadian anter, November 9 2019 - 9:07 PM.

[Canadian anter]

Lasius crypticus

Coming Soon

Lasius interjectus
Sold Out

Lasius latipes
Sold Out

Lasius murphyi
Sold Out

Lasius neoniger/pallitarsis


Lasius subumbratus
Coming Soon

Leptothorax acervorum
Coming Soon

Leptothorax canadensis
Coming Soon

Manica hunteri
Sold Out

Manica invidia
Sold Out

Monomorium minimum
Sold Out

Monomorium pharaonis
Sold Out

Edited by Canadian anter, December 3 2019 - 6:41 AM.

[Canadian anter]

Myrmecina americana
Coming Soon

Myrmica americana
Sold Out


Myrmica alaskensis

Single Queen - 10$ - 5 available


Myrmica brevispinosa
Sold Out
Myrmica crassirugis
Single Queen - 25$ - 1 available

Myrmica discontinua

Single Queen - 10$ - 16 available


Myrmica incompleta

Single Queen - 20$ - 4 available


Myrmica latrifrons
Sold Out

Myrmica pinetorum

Single Queen - 10$ - 2 available


Myrmica punctiventris

Single Queen - 10$ - 11 available
Myrmica rubra

Single Queen - 10$ - 4 available


Pogonomyrmex occidentalis
Sold Out
Ponera pennsylvanica

Single Queen - 15$ - 5 available


Prenolepis imparis
Sold Out

Stenamma diecki
Coming Soon

Stigmatomma pallipes
Sold Out

Tapinoma melanocephalum

Queen + 5-10 workers - 15$ - 10 available
2 Queens + 10-20 workers - 25$ - 5 available
3 Queens + 15-30 workers - 35$ - 5 available
5 Queens + 30-50 workers - 55$ - 5 available



Tapinoma sessile
Sold Out

Temnothorax curvispinosus
Sold Out



Tetramorium bicarinatum

Queen + 5-10 workers - 20$ - 10 available
2 Queens + 10-20 workers - 30$ - 5 available
3 Queens + 15-30 workers - 40$ - 5 available
5 Queens + 30-50 workers - 55$ - 5 available

Tetramorium immigrans

Single Queen - 10Single Queen - 10$ - 10 available$ - 10 available
Queen + 1-5 workers - 20$ - 5 available
Queen + 5-10 workers - 30$ - 3 available
Queen + 10-25 workers - 40$ - 2 available
Queen + 25-50 workers - 55$ - 1 available
Queen + 50-100 workers - 70$ - 1 available

Edited by Canadian anter, December 3 2019 - 6:40 AM.

[Canadian anter]

Pictures will be updated periodically.

[OwlThatLikesAnts]

I have checked out your ant store, and some of these species are not one the store. also is the list frequently updated?

[bmb1bee]

I have checked out your ant store, and some of these species are not one the store. also is the list frequently updated?

The post was last updated in 2019, so I’d recommend you just check the website.

[Ants_Dakota]

I have checked out your ant store, and some of these species are not one the store. also is the list frequently updated?

Sadly, most business owners leave formiculture after their business takes off. Examples include AnthonyP and stateside ants, Buckeye Myrmecology, drtrmiller, and others. I would have included Canada Ant Colony, but they just made a post about medicine and ants, so at least they have come back. This is one of the main reasons I don't purchase ants, as you can't see the face behind the business. Its almost as if a love for ants has been replaced with a singular focus on getting and selling as many as possible. I want to see and hear about their colonies and experiences! So lets hope they come back and update their journals.

[OwlThatLikesAnts]

Hmm, I wanted to see if they are still selling and I can get ants that are not on the website

[rptraut]

Hello OwlThatLikesAnts;

 

When you PM'd me about Canada Ant Colony I told you this.

 

"Canada Ant Colony used to be a reliable supplier, but lately they seem to be slipping in the customer satisfaction area.    Last time I bought queens from them, it took numerous emails to get them to send me a replacement for a queen that died within days of me receiving it.    I suspected she was infertile as she still had her wings and died quickly.    They often didn't return my emails, and it took me about 1 1/2 months to get the replacement queen.     When I've bought queens in the past, they've been much better than this.    They've been making some changes lately, hopefully they've got things figured out. "

 

Today I received this as part of a larger email.

 

Warehousing Update

A Message from our Founder:

Hi, this is Zach. I wanted to apologize for any problems you may have had with orders and shipping over the past few weeks. In the last 5-6 weeks, we've had a lot of issues with shipping. Orders were delayed significantly, particularly those with specific products that were bottlenecked, such as outworlds. Not everyone's orders were impacted, but many were. 

Most of the problems came from issues with internal communication, particularly in relation to staffing. One of our key staff member left the company in mid-July. After that, many orders in warehousing were incorrectly labeled as shipped, and orders with certain products had repeated delays due to issues with our warehousing process.

We discovered these issues far too late, but we are learning from our mistakes and have been adding new safeguards to make sure your orders arrive on time. In the meantime, we have already hired more staff, modified work hours, and begun testing a direct warehouse-to-customer service line to improve efficiency.

 

For anyone who has had a negative experience with us, I wanted to personally apologize for this. As of September 1st, our order backlog should be more or less cleared. 

If you have any orders that are late, and/or have yet to be shipped, please let me know. If you've had any negative experiences with our order process, please know that you have my commitment to ensure these issues don't happen again in the future. 

 

We deeply appreciate your business and support.

Zach

 

 

As you can read, they've been having problems as I said, although I haven't noticed a big difference in their service as yet.    My most recent order for a Crematogaster queen and workers received on August 26th is an example.   I paid for 25 to 50 workers, a significant increase in cost I was willing to pay for a colony with a high chance of success.   What I received was a queen with no brood and 20 living workers.    Five or six workers had died tangled in the cotton.   This wasn't the first time I've received workers on the low end of the range I'd paid for.   I've also been amazed many times at the ability of ants to survive long delivery times.

 

Lack of communication has been their biggest problem area.   I've sent them numerous emails and received no response.   Recently I emailed them about selling or trading some of my duplicate colonies, no response.

 

Zach, if you're reading this, review your communications and orders that you've had from me.   I've complained to you directly in emails and received no response.   I was frankly surprised to read that Canada Ant Colony was branching into the US market when I felt they needed to do a much better job with their Canadian customers if my experience was any example.   I was even more surprised to hear about the new medical endeavor for the same reason.   

 

OwlThatLikesAnts, I've had problems with Canada Ant Colony, but I can only hope the improvements mentioned in the message above will improve the customer service that's been so lacking in the past. 

RPT 

Edited by rptraut, September 9 2024 - 8:35 AM.

[OwlThatLikesAnts]

 

OwlThatLikesAnts, I've had problems with Ant Colony Canada, but I can only hope the improvements mentioned in the message above will improve the customer service that's been so lacking in the past. 

RPT 

I am planning on buying from them this November, if they still have this problem I will let you know

Edited by OwlThatLikesAnts, September 9 2024 - 8:47 AM.

[ANTdrew]

Finding your own ants is just infinitely better than ordering them. You might have to make do with ordinary species in your area, but your chances of success are so much higher. Learning to love the ants in your local area is one of the best things about this hobby.

[Canadian anter]

Hello OwlThatLikesAnts;

 

When you PM'd me about Canada Ant Colony I told you this.

 

"Canada Ant Colony used to be a reliable supplier, but lately they seem to be slipping in the customer satisfaction area.    Last time I bought queens from them, it took numerous emails to get them to send me a replacement for a queen that died within days of me receiving it.    I suspected she was infertile as she still had her wings and died quickly.    They often didn't return my emails, and it took me about 1 1/2 months to get the replacement queen.     When I've bought queens in the past, they've been much better than this.    They've been making some changes lately, hopefully they've got things figured out. "

 

Today I received this as part of a larger email.

 

Warehousing Update

A Message from our Founder:

Hi, this is Zach. I wanted to apologize for any problems you may have had with orders and shipping over the past few weeks. In the last 5-6 weeks, we've had a lot of issues with shipping. Orders were delayed significantly, particularly those with specific products that were bottlenecked, such as outworlds. Not everyone's orders were impacted, but many were. 

Most of the problems came from issues with internal communication, particularly in relation to staffing. One of our key staff member left the company in mid-July. After that, many orders in warehousing were incorrectly labeled as shipped, and orders with certain products had repeated delays due to issues with our warehousing process.

We discovered these issues far too late, but we are learning from our mistakes and have been adding new safeguards to make sure your orders arrive on time. In the meantime, we have already hired more staff, modified work hours, and begun testing a direct warehouse-to-customer service line to improve efficiency.

 

For anyone who has had a negative experience with us, I wanted to personally apologize for this. As of September 1st, our order backlog should be more or less cleared. 

If you have any orders that are late, and/or have yet to be shipped, please let me know. If you've had any negative experiences with our order process, please know that you have my commitment to ensure these issues don't happen again in the future. 

 

We deeply appreciate your business and support.

Zach

 

 

As you can read, they've been having problems as I said, although I haven't noticed a big difference in their service as yet.    My most recent order for a Crematogaster queen and workers received on August 26th is an example.   I paid for 25 to 50 workers, a significant increase in cost I was willing to pay for a colony with a high chance of success.   What I received was a queen with no brood and 20 living workers.    Five or six workers had died tangled in the cotton.   This wasn't the first time I've received workers on the low end of the range I'd paid for.   I've also been amazed many times at the ability of ants to survive long delivery times.

 

Lack of communication has been their biggest problem area.   I've sent them numerous emails and received no response.   Recently I emailed them about selling or trading some of my duplicate colonies, no response.

 

Zach, if you're reading this, review your communications and orders that you've had from me.   I've complained to you directly in emails and received no response.   I was frankly surprised to read that Canada Ant Colony was branching into the US market when I felt they needed to do a much better job with their Canadian customers if my experience was any example.   I was even more surprised to hear about the new medical endeavor for the same reason.   

 

OwlThatLikesAnts, I've had problems with Canada Ant Colony, but I can only hope the improvements mentioned in the message above will improve the customer service that's been so lacking in the past. 

RPT 

Hi Robert!

 

I appreciate the message. I'm going to look into any past communications with you, along with our customer service and see what's wrong. I'll see if there was any issue that meant yours slipped through and see if there's a way so that it doesn't happen in the future. I'll probably send you a PM about this afterwards once I figure it out. Re: Your surprise at the other projects, branching in the US market and the medical endeavor were projects which had started all the way back in spring, but just weren't publicized.

 

I agree with you that I have to improve customer satisfaction for Canadian customers. In the next couple weeks, everyone who had orders with errors or delays in that month and a half will receive messages to amend any issues they faced with their order and for feedback so we resolve things for the future, we just have to go through the list. We recently have been onboarding and retraining warehousing staff to fix shipping issues, and are modifying our inventory so items get delayed as little as possible. 

 

One reason for a slight difference in service (just in general), is that I started college, and our operations take place in a warehouse that I do not live close to. In the past, I was able to personally manage a lot of the issues that occurred, but it's been more difficult when I'm not down there and unfortunately that has impacted service. Getting everything in the warehouse back on track will be where the bulk of my attention is put to in the next few months. I hope that in the future the experience you had with us will not happen again in then the future. 

 

I apologize for the experience and I will try my best to ensure it only improves.

Zach

[Canadian anter]

 

I have checked out your ant store, and some of these species are not one the store. also is the list frequently updated?

Sadly, most business owners leave formiculture after their business takes off. Examples include AnthonyP and stateside ants, Buckeye Myrmecology, drtrmiller, and others. I would have included Canada Ant Colony, but they just made a post about medicine and ants, so at least they have come back. This is one of the main reasons I don't purchase ants, as you can't see the face behind the business. Its almost as if a love for ants has been replaced with a singular focus on getting and selling as many as possible. I want to see and hear about their colonies and experiences! So lets hope they come back and update their journals.

 

Re: OwlThatLikesAnts

Unfortunately because the number of colonies I would have to track, I currently am not able to keep the formiculture post updated. The list here is not often updated, but the website is accurate for the most part. If you want a specific species not on the store, you're free to message me and I'll see what I can do.

 

 

Re: Ants_Dakota

I do want to give a bit more perspective here, since I communicate regularly or have spoken to most of the folks on that list.

 

There was a point when I was running Canada Ant Colony personally where I was spending hours every day feeding ants, packaging ants, photographing ants, and collecting ants. There's a point where it definitely feels like a job more than it does a hobby, and it becomes more difficult to come to a forum for "leisure" just to talk about ants overall. I'm guessing that a lot of folks who primarily work with ants as a "day job", whether or not it's commercial, would be able to relate to that sentiment.

 

Another thing is that Anthony, Buckeye Myrmecology, and I were all around high school when we started selling ants. I know that Luke (Buckeye) and I have struggled juggling college and the business. Luke and I also sometimes work (to varying degrees) in myrmecology labs (although I personally have reduced my involvement to focus more on fixing the customer side of things in my business). Even if we're working with ants for several hours a day, it just doesn't leave as much time for "Fun ant things" like updating journals. I can't speak to Anthony's specifics, and (I believe) he's transitioned to working on ants full time, but I imagine that (to some extent, I could totally be projecting) it's normal to feel a certain level of ant fatigue with that amount of "ant work" on your plate. I can say that I just had a lot more time in early high school than I do now, which is what I used to dedicate to formiculture.

 

I do know that Terry is very busy as well, I believe this year he moved both his house and the business, and is being kept up by several new puppies he's caring for.

 

One last thing is that most of us till are active in ant communities, just not formiculture specifically. I still (on near-daily basis) visit Canadian Bug Keepers (on Discord) and I believe Anthony regularly talks on Ant Keeping and Ethology (also on Discord). Luke was more active in AAK (on Discord) too. I personally prefer discord since it feels more relaxed, while on formiculture I typically post more high-effort and extensive posts which need more bandwidth than I honestly have available. For that matter, just because of the different lifestyle I have in college, I would guess that my involvement on formiculture would have weaned off even had I not begun selling ants.

 

Maybe if am in a position where I once again have a lot of free time to play around with, that will change.

 

Zach

[Ants_Dakota]

 

 

I have checked out your ant store, and some of these species are not one the store. also is the list frequently updated?

Sadly, most business owners leave formiculture after their business takes off. Examples include AnthonyP and stateside ants, Buckeye Myrmecology, drtrmiller, and others. I would have included Canada Ant Colony, but they just made a post about medicine and ants, so at least they have come back. This is one of the main reasons I don't purchase ants, as you can't see the face behind the business. Its almost as if a love for ants has been replaced with a singular focus on getting and selling as many as possible. I want to see and hear about their colonies and experiences! So lets hope they come back and update their journals.

 

Re: OwlThatLikesAnts

Unfortunately because the number of colonies I would have to track, I currently am not able to keep the formiculture post updated. The list here is not often updated, but the website is accurate for the most part. If you want a specific species not on the store, you're free to message me and I'll see what I can do.

 

 

Re: Ants_Dakota

I do want to give a bit more perspective here, since I communicate regularly or have spoken to most of the folks on that list.

 

There was a point when I was running Canada Ant Colony personally where I was spending hours every day feeding ants, packaging ants, photographing ants, and collecting ants. There's a point where it definitely feels like a job more than it does a hobby, and it becomes more difficult to come to a forum for "leisure" just to talk about ants overall. I'm guessing that a lot of folks who primarily work with ants as a "day job", whether or not it's commercial, would be able to relate to that sentiment.

 

Another thing is that Anthony, Buckeye Myrmecology, and I were all around high school when we started selling ants. I know that Luke (Buckeye) and I have struggled juggling college and the business. Luke and I also sometimes work (to varying degrees) in myrmecology labs (although I personally have reduced my involvement to focus more on fixing the customer side of things in my business). Even if we're working with ants for several hours a day, it just doesn't leave as much time for "Fun ant things" like updating journals. I can't speak to Anthony's specifics, and (I believe) he's transitioned to working on ants full time, but I imagine that (to some extent, I could totally be projecting) it's normal to feel a certain level of ant fatigue with that amount of "ant work" on your plate. I can say that I just had a lot more time in early high school than I do now, which is what I used to dedicate to formiculture.

 

I do know that Terry is very busy as well, I believe this year he moved both his house and the business, and is being kept up by several new puppies he's caring for.

 

One last thing is that most of us till are active in ant communities, just not formiculture specifically. I still (on near-daily basis) visit Canadian Bug Keepers (on Discord) and I believe Anthony regularly talks on Ant Keeping and Ethology (also on Discord). Luke was more active in AAK (on Discord) too. I personally prefer discord since it feels more relaxed, while on formiculture I typically post more high-effort and extensive posts which need more bandwidth than I honestly have available. For that matter, just because of the different lifestyle I have in college, I would guess that my involvement on formiculture would have weaned off even had I not begun selling ants.

 

Maybe if am in a position where I once again have a lot of free time to play around with, that will change.

 

Zach

 

Firstly, thank you for the well reasoned response, I really appreciate it. I do completely understand the pressures you are all are going through; I get how hard taking care of even a dozen ant colonies is. I suppose I am not involved much in the discord community and so there is much that goes behind my back in terms of communication and posts from business owners such as yourself. I think I may have underestimated the reach and scale of your and other's businesses and the amount of colonies being managed and sold, as I never imagined that ant keeping could take off so fast. While I don't plan on buying colonies in the future, I know you have wonderful products and colonies to be sold to both new and experienced ant keepers, and I am very glad for the transparency that you have into business operations, it definitely builds ethos in my opinion. I am glad I could talk to you in a more or less personal manner. Thank you for building up the hobby!
Ants_Dakota

Edited by Ants_Dakota, September 9 2024 - 7:57 PM.

[rptraut]

Hello Zach;

 

Thank you very much for your response and apology.   I do know of the changes you've been going through and throughout my troubles I've always given you and your company the benefit of the doubt.   My wife was amazed with my patience.   I just hope I was the only customer who fell victim to many of the problems you mentioned in your statement.   Your Canadian customers need your company to be responsive and responsible and we look forward to the improvements you've implemented.  

RPT

[rptraut]

Finding your own ants is just infinitely better than ordering them. You might have to make do with ordinary species in your area, but your chances of success are so much higher. Learning to love the ants in your local area is one of the best things about this hobby.

 

That's hilarious ANTdrew, it was because of your praise of them that I decided to give Crematogaster ants a try!   I do agree that the highest chances of success will be with local ants.  But I'm sure you can appreciate that after a while, an ant keeper is ready for a challenging species.   I haven't bought anything too exotic, Lasius niger, Crematogaster, Lasius brevicornis, and Brachymyrmex depilis and I've had varying levels of success.    Regardless, they've added interest to my ant keeping and I've learned a lot along the way.   

RPT