Hello everyone.
At the start of the month, I collected a Tapinoma nigerrimum colony which was wandering around my doorsteps.
Right now, the colony has 4 queens and ~150 workers.
As soon as I collected them, I made a test tube and put it in box. The ants quickly moved in.
I later moved them in another setup with a plaster floor and they are in it since about a week. I also put a short plastic tubing to make the nest's entrance smaller and they seemed to like it, as they're now not always sticking to the wet cotton.
However, in their new setup they stopped eating! Usually there are 0 workers outside in the outworld, but sometimes there are up to 5 max. I even tried heating them up (form 20°C to 25°C). All they did was relocating inside their nest.
20°C:
25°C:
When the colony was in the old setup, they even ate a fly! The day I captured them they filled up their gasters with a few drops of honey, and still kept eating a bit of honey (like an ant going out to feed a few times a day) and they were accepting small insects.
But in the setup with the floor made out of plaster, they always stay inside their test tube! Why that? The queens even laid a good bunch of eggs in the meantime.
Should I be worried? Is the setup flawed, or is this normal because they're all full of food and don't need to eat? Will they start to eat more once the brood develops?
Any help is appreciated!
Edited by noobkeeper, May 21 2017 - 9:00 AM.
