69 replies to this topic

[Crystals]

Is all the brood at the top to avoid the more humid lower chambers, or because the top is warmer?

[dspdrew]

They are avoiding the moisture near the bottom. I am finding that most of my colonies of all different species really do not like much moisture. I'm starting to understand why the Germans think we are weird with all our obsessive focus on hydration.

[Myrmicinae]

They are avoiding the moisture near the bottom. I am finding that most of my colonies of all different species really do not like much moisture. I'm starting to understand why the Germans think we are weird with all our obsessive focus on hydration.

 

What material do the Germans most commonly use in their formicaria?

[dspdrew]

Well all I can say is what we were told by our hand-full of German members here who visit from time to time. I think it was mostly Ytong. They said they don't even hydrate anything, and instead just provide water in liquid feeders. Now that might be fine for some species of ants, but I know some will die if they don't have enough humidity; I've had it happen when test tubes ran out of water without me knowing. Even though the colony had liquid to drink, they all dried up and died.

[dspdrew]

Update 6-11-2015
 
The colony has reached a population of about 1500 now, many of which are male and female alates too. When I first put them in this formicarium, not only was it not specifically designed for ants this small, but the colony was also very small for the size of the formicarium. The latter has definitely changed, and they're now really starting to fill this thing up.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
They've been eating a lot of food lately, presumably because of all the alate brood that needs to be fed.
 

[dermy]

That's great about the alates!

[dspdrew]

Update 6-16-2015
 
Yesterday when I got home from work around 4:00 PM, the colony was having a mating flight. Alates and workers were swarming all over the place in the out world, and there were males climbing up the liquid feeders and flying around.

[Foogoo]

Does that mean you now have a bunch of fertilized queens running around the nest?

[dspdrew]

Does that mean you now have a bunch of fertilized queens running around the nest?

 

Probably not. I never actually saw any mating.

[Myrmicinae]

Are those alates still alive?

[dspdrew]

Yes.

[dspdrew]

Update 8-11-2015
 
There is still a lot of alates left in the colony, although most of them have been killed off it seems. They made a very large pile of trash including many of those dead alates in the far back of the out world, and due to the recent high humidity, and the closed ant cabinet raising it even more, all that trash began to mold pretty bad. It got to a point where the ants were starting to build tunnels in the fungus, so I figured it was time to clean it out.
 

 
 
I found an easy way to get all the ants back into their nest so I could work on the out world. I just put a hot light right over the top of them, and once they all retreated to the nest to get out of the extreme heat, I just plugged the hole.
 

 
 
The colony has shrunk in size slightly because I haven't been able to even open the top and feed them for over a month.
 
Everything is all clean now, and they have been fed. I just got a new bag of cichlid fish pellets the other day for my Acromyrmex and I decided to give some of them to these guys, since they are harvester ants and they like dry food. They quickly snatched them all up and had a feast. It's interesting the way these ants eat. They like to pin their food to the walls or the ceilings of their chambers and hold it there while they eat it. I don't think I've ever seen them eating something on the floor of their chamber.

[Foogoo]

Why do they kill off the alates? Because they didn't fly?

[dspdrew]

As far as I know, they either do that or just evict them if they're left-overs.

[BrittonLS]

If they don't fly they're just draining nest resources and are useless to the colony. Better to kill them than feed them and take care of them from the ant's perspective. 

[drtrmiller]

The entire purpose of ant colonies is to reproduce—a colony would not eliminate its reproductive potential—a great investment in energy and time—without good reason.

 

Many species overwinter alates.  Since ants do not have an understanding of the world around them the same way we do, but rather operate on many simple if this, then that instructions, it is more likely that the reproductives were recycled or removed due to adverse environmental conditions or lack of food.

 

True that the colony should survive than the reproductives—but just understand that the decision making process was more rule-based and fixed, versus something premeditated and carefully thought out.

[dspdrew]

Not sure how you can say their decision making process is rule-based, but then also claim that they are actually aware of how much of an investment it was to create alates and thus make decisions based on that.

[dspdrew]

Update 8-13-2015
 
Well it looks like most of their alates are still there. They've been swarming in the evenings again right around the time I get home from work every day.

 

Here's some video I got of them this time.

 

[William. T]

You should release some outside to breed with the other alates, and then collect the spoils. You would have still mated captive queens.

 

Update 8-13-2015
 
Well it looks like most of their alates are still there. They've been swarming in the evenings again right around the time I get home from work every day.

 

Here's some video I got of them this time.

 

[dspdrew]

These don't live outside my house.