5 replies to this topic

[mcwoodhill]

I got this kickstarter colony and when it arrived, the fungus garden was totally dismantled and scattered everywhere in a small sauce box. Most of them presumably went dead.

Then I added some Atta M fungus and they accepted it right away. But after they fed it with some steel cut oats, they stopped feedin the fungus garden. Occasionally a forager brought back some pedal or oat pieces, they wouldn’t mount it on the fungus but left em there. The colony just stay on and around the fungus very quietly.

The fungus insofar looks healthy and grows at a very slow pace but without feeding it becomes whiter day by day.

Why did they stop feeding the fungus? What must I do to reenergize the colony and reboot the feeding?

I know a picture speaks better than thousand of words but it’s quite tough to post pix with my iPad.

Big big thanks in advance.

[mbullock42086]

  humidity should be quite high, and temp should be 75-77, 80 IMO is already too high from my experiences with acromyrmex.

  if it's too bright in the room maybe that could be an issue?  Sounds like the oats kinda caused it, dunno.  maybe there was something toxic on your fingers?  


edit- perhaps your colony is too large for the fungus you have?  how many workers are left?  founding colonies are faster when it's just a queen and a few more individuals, because there's less food to go around in the early stages.

  try yellow fallen leaves, maybe that'll help

Edited by mbullock42086, September 14 2024 - 11:33 PM.

[mcwoodhill]

I guess they're just slow growers. They fed the fungus with some oats yesterday and now r laidback again.

[ruth]

Hello, maybe it's because the fungus Is already big enough for them or maybe there Is no more space for It to grow up, try to give then diferente plants each week because they won't feed the fungus if you give them always the same plants, you can try with Rose petals and stems. You don't have to worry too much about the light because the fungus gives them enough darkness and you can open the box from Time to Time to prevent it from fogging up. I don't have much experience with Atta, I have only captured one queen but unfortunately she died, they are a really hard species so there Is few info about them, but you should read "Leaf cutter ants Civilization by instinct" by Bert Holldöbler and Edward O Wilson, you can also see El mundo de las hormigas and Texants YouTube channels, they will give you a whole diferente perspective of this species.

Edited by ruth, September 18 2024 - 12:02 AM.

[mbullock42086]

 they always take forever to start up from scratch. it's because these guys are actually fully claustral and don't forage like acromyrmex queens
  they carry a fairly large chunk of fungus and medium with them in the wild, so they don't have to forage, unlike Acromyrmex, which take a teeny little pellet, mostly just an actual chunk of fungus itself without medium.

(medium meaning leaves oats, etc)  the actual food of the fungus is the fecal droplets, the medium is just a sterile carbohydrate structure the mycelium can grow on.
  you can use steel cut oats to culture mushrooms of all kinds, so long as they're saprobes, which Leucocoprinus gongylus (the species mexicana farms) is. 

has anyone actually farmed this fungus?  If you could find the actual mushroom and get a spore print, i'd imagine you could inoculate just about anything with it and grow it yourself.

  You would need to create a sterile room though, and a good hepa filter to prevent spores from entering

EDIT:  Leucoagaricus gongylophorus.

 Dude i swear i read articles mentioning Leucocoprinus.. 

  https://en.wikipedia...s_gongylophorus

  are these two synonyms?  
 
Edit:  yep.  At least i don't feel stupid now.

Edited by mbullock42086, September 19 2024 - 11:42 AM.

[ruth]

https://colombia.ina...s-gongylophorus