63 replies to this topic

[honourable]

I don't hydrate the nest for the camponotus at all. I keep C. vicinus in ants canada vertical omninest.

I don't see any ants spitting water in the nest. They seem to know to hydrate it and are doing well.

I have a heat lamp I put on the side of the nest, not that close either. They seem to move their eggs away from it and don't like the heat as much as the novomessor cockerelli.

I just put the whole nest for camponotus in the fridge.

My 20 gallon formicaria can't fit in the fridge, so I keep novomessor cockerelli and honeypots (coming soon) which don't need hibernation.

[soulsynapse]

cheers for the quick reply, looking forward to seeing your progress!

[honourable]

So I've decided to do just 1 side for the nesting area as opposed to 3 like my Novomessor Cockerelli.

But this nesting area is massive and can hold thousands of repletes hopefully.

 

This looks small in the image but it is 21" by 8".

I will finish up the side and top soon. Maybe by next week everything will be ready. 

The inside is actually lined with a fine sand and this way the honeypot can hang on to the wall.

Edited by honourable, August 3 2017 - 9:52 PM.

[Zeiss]

That looks very well made.  Good luck with your colonies in it!

[NZAntKeeper]

Very cool! 

[Byronicus1]

Very jealous...

[Bryansant]

11) Use toothpicks, small pointy sticks, and your nails to take out the clay.

I washed my nest with a garden hose while I was taking out the clay. Don't worry the water won't do anything to the hydrostone once it's set.

Have fund cleaning out the clay if you have OCD. I was almost going crazy trying to get EVERYTHING out.

 

I've not worked with hydrostone, but working with grout I coat all my clay tunnels with cooking oil prior to pouring the grout. Once the grout has hardened I can pull the clay out very easily and cleanly without much at all sticking to the grout.  

[FeedTheAnts]

Oh my goodness! That is the coolest setup I have ever seen. I need to buy some hydrstone, where do you get yours?

[JackPearl]

Awesome fomicarium!

[honourable]

You can buy hydrostone at local pottery stores, or on ebay.

ebay (plasterguys) 25 lbs for $34.

Amazon doesn't have any good deals. 5 lbs for $25.

 

If you're doing a small formicarium 25 lbs is more than enough. 

I have to fix a problem with my tank before I can finish it. Currently the front side is bowing outwards which leaves a gap between the acrylic and the nest. Hopefully a heatgun will fix this.

[honourable]

Here's my set up now:

[honourable]

[dspdrew]

Looks nice. I'm getting more anxious to make my natural setups now.

[StopSpazzing]

Do you know the weight of that new hydro-stone block with the dragon stone? You should get cost of shipping, people may be willing to buy blocks of it cause looks really professional. If you are looking to sell it that is.

Edited by StopSpazzing, September 7 2017 - 4:31 PM.

[honourable]

I don't plan to sell it since it won't be fun as a hobby. The tank is heavy. I plan to add black gravel/sand and large dragon stones to make a nice landscape, but that's only after the colony moves in. Stay tuned it will be awesome! The different colors for the two top tiles was due to a different ratio when mixing hydrostone, but it won't matter much once the sand is added.

[honourable]

The small dirt tank on top is the honeypot m. Mexicanus that I got from drew and it will go on the new formicarium.

[StopSpazzing]

Can I have your permission to add some of these images to the wiki?

[honourable]

Of course!

[BMM]

I had thought about using some dragonstone/ohko stone is one of my outworlds. It's pretty soft though, so I was a bit worried that the ants might tunnel into it.

[honourable]

Yeah it is pretty soft, but I think it should be OK since I cover the back completely with hydrostone there's no way they can tunnel through it.