46 replies to this topic

[CoolColJ]

guaranteed to resist destructive ants
 

 

Edited by CoolColJ, September 17 2018 - 2:48 PM.

[T.C.]

You make these? They look awesome. Not sure how well they'd work but its different for sure.

[CoolColJ]

You make these? They look awesome. Not sure how well they'd work but its different for sure.

No, someone on Facebook was offering these free, since they had casting defects, and you had to pay for the postage, but since they are heavy it will cost a lot

Edited by CoolColJ, September 17 2018 - 3:18 PM.

[DaveJay]

You make these? They look awesome. Not sure how well they'd work but its different for sure.

No, someone on Facebook was offering these free, since they had casting defects, and you had to pay for the postage, but since they are heavy it will cost a lot

Just under $15 for express postage up to 3kg Colin, not too bad.

[Serafine]

Steel tends to be very cold unless you add a heat mat so they're probably not really suitable for most species. Might be perfect for winter ants though.

Edited by Serafine, September 17 2018 - 10:57 PM.

[drtrmiller]

Really dislike the wasteful, completely unnecessary material choice. 

 

Steel tends to be very cold unless you add a heat mat so they're probably not really suitable for most species. Might be perfect for winter ants though.

 

You're referring to the thermal conductivity, not the actual temperature. And that isn't a problem I foresee as much as the fact that metal is highly reactive, and ants are walking chemical factories.  There are a million and one reasons why any type of metal is one of the worst possible material choices for a formicarium, attempting to solve a non-existent problem.

[dspdrew]

 

Steel tends to be very cold unless you add a heat mat so they're probably not really suitable for most species. Might be perfect for winter ants though.

 
You're referring to the thermal conductivity, not the actual temperature.

 

Yeah, it sucks the heat out of your skin faster than other materials, so it feels cold.

[sirjordanncurtis]

Do you know if he's still giving them away?

[nurbs]

These formicariums made of plastic, acrylic, steel... they always look great. But you never see a live thriving colony in them. Always antless. 

[CoolColJ]

These formicariums made of plastic, acrylic, steel... they always look great. But you never see a live thriving colony in them. Always antless.

Seen plenty of big colonies in plastic and acrylic nests...

These are no different from a tub and tubes setup and colonies thrive in these
 

Do you know if he's still giving them away?

he is, but they may already been spoken for

Edited by CoolColJ, September 18 2018 - 2:06 PM.

[nurbs]

 

These formicariums made of plastic, acrylic, steel... they always look great. But you never see a live thriving colony in them. Always antless.

Seen plenty of big colonies in plastic and acrylic nests...
 

Show me video and pics. 

 

 

These are no different from a tub and tubes setup and colonies thrive in these
 

No, they are not!!

[CoolColJ]

These formicariums made of plastic, acrylic, steel... they always look great. But you never see a live thriving colony in them. Always antless.

Seen plenty of big colonies in plastic and acrylic nests...

Show me video and pics. 
 
 

These are no different from a tub and tubes setup and colonies thrive in these

No, they are not!!

Messor Barbarus



Pheidole - single queen


Camponotus consobrinus


RobJ's Camponotus Nicobarensis

Edited by CoolColJ, September 18 2018 - 4:46 PM.

[nurbs]

All of those videos look like they just dumped a mature colony of ants into the nests, especially the last one. Ants will poop, smear, bring in dead insects and food, and pretty much muddy up the area they are in over a period of time. Notice how unbelievably CLEAN some of those nests are. And it looks like they are still moving around really fast and not "settled", like they were just dumped in. Where is the food that they drag into the nests?

 

The messor looks somewhat legit? But the rest does not look like they grew up in the plastic. 

 

It is probably species dependent, but every California ant I've raised does not like acrylic based formicariums. I wanted them to work. But ants just do not like them. I've tried four acrylic based nests from China ordered via Aliexpress, and also two OMNI nests from AC for a Make-a-Wish child (he insisted on getting it), and workers died in every single one of these nests. Some species may do OK in them, but as a whole they do not thrive or seem happy.

 

 

EDIT:

Here are some of my mature colonies living in THA nests, all different species. All have been in the nest at least 3 months, some almost a year except the last two images from a THA Casita, which is only a week old.

 

Notice what they do with the glass. They will put food, poop, dirt, and all kinds of matter onto the surface. Those videos with the super clean acrylic surface are very misleading.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by nurbs, September 18 2018 - 6:06 PM.

[CoolColJ]

The guy who did the Pheidole video has always had the Pheidole in these acrylic nests, maybe he filmed that video after they moved into that larger nests
That guy has tons of ant species that he is keeping and posts regular updates on his ants everyday on Instagram so he is legit

Here is an older video of the same colony, from Dec last year, in a much smaller nest, they obviously exploded in growth to the video above.




And the C.consobrinus have always lived in that glass housing, here they had a bubble wrap nest

Edited by CoolColJ, September 18 2018 - 6:46 PM.

[Barristan]

There are many examples of ant keepers which keep ants successful in acrylic or 3d-printed formicarium. I highly doubt that all these colonies have been forcefully dumped into the nest. 

 

In my experience especially ants which normally build nests in wood do also great in plastic formicariums since they don't need a lot of moisture.

 

I personally prefer however nests made out of AAC, plaster, concrete, wood etc for my ant colonies. When using acrylic or plastic formicariums you always have to be very carefull with condensate. If a lot of it drops down from the glass ants or brood may drown. And you can also create more natural looking nests with these materials if you add some loam etc.

Edited by Barristan, September 18 2018 - 9:16 PM.

[Serafine]

These formicariums made of plastic, acrylic, steel... they always look great. But you never see a live thriving colony in them. Always antless. 

The problem isn't those nests, the problem is that colonies often get dumped into these nests while they are still waaay too small for anything other than a test tube or a natural nest.

Doesn't help that many of them are advertised as founding fomicaria (which imo is utter nonsense) but then that's obviously where the money is - or how many journal ant colonies beyond 1k workers that may require an actual large nest have you seen over the last year? Probably not enough to sustain even a single manufacturer producing only large nests.

 

About ants not doing well in artificial nests...

 

Solenopsis geminata in acrylic nests:

 

Camponotus barbaricus in 3D-printed nests (note how clean those nests are even after more than a year).

http://www.formicult...baricus/page-13

 

 

Their setup now also includes a single acrylic nest and while they haven't brought in any brood yet, they definitely like to hang around in it.

Edited by Serafine, September 18 2018 - 11:05 PM.

[nurbs]

I've tried acrylic nests on a number of different California species - with them all failing. I too wish acrylic nests would work.

 

My point in replying is not to argue, but simply to share firsthand experience so other users on this forum can get solid advice and not just from what they see on YouTube.

 

For example, earlier this year, I had a rep from the Make-a-Wish foundation come to me with a list of things a child wanted. One of them was a mature colony of V. pergandei with an XL Omni nest. I told the child and the mother repeatedly the nest would most likely not work, but the child insisted on it, mostly because of what he saw on YouTube. The rep and I went ahead and ordered the nest, and we did a "test run" where I dropped in about three dozen workers in the the Omni nest. All the workers died within the first day. We informed the mother and the child, stressing them to get something else from another vendor like THA - but they didn't believe us, so we just went ahead gave them the nest with my mature colony of V. pergandei with 500+ workers. Sure enough, once the child got the ants and put them in the Omni nest, the colony collapsed within the week.

 

Also, ants that nest in wood do not do well in acrylic based nests. Here in CA, we have C. quercicola, an ant that is 100% arboreal and lives in Oak. They do not do well in acrylic nests. Same with C. laevigatus and C. vicinus. Your assumption is that wood is air tight, therefore it must do well in acrylic. Wood and acrylic cannot be anymore different.

 

If you pour water into wood, it will eventually soak it up. Acrylic is completely waterproof and airtight, and will retain the water. My theory on why ants - as a whole - do not do well in acrylic or 3d printed nests is that they have CHCs and pheremones. Some spray formic acid. Some have a poison gland. Most have a Dufour's gland. An acrylic based air tight nest that has no way for the air to "breathe" and release these scents can be harmful the ants. There is nothing in nature that imitates acrylic.

 

Am I saying that there are no ants that can do well in Acrylics nests? Of course not. For example, look at Ants Canada's Solenopsis. Some of you who live in Germany can only dream of having such an amazing and wonderful ant - as you watch AC's video drooling to every frame with lust and envy. But for those of us who have kept this absolutely wonderful species here stateside, they can be reared in our own spit without an issue. Acrylic shouldn't be a problem.

 

[CoolColJ]

I personally find acrylic nests too airy, there can be relatively large gaps between the acrylic layers

And so water wicks and evaporate much faster in these nests with the same amount of water than in a test tube setup

 

I haven't had any issue with mold with the acrylic founding nest I'm using with one of my Melophorus as a result.

While my THA Atom C nest, which uses a water pool that has no actual water contact with the nest surface, so you would think would not have mold issues did.

Peices of left over cricket bits grew hairy mold which spread throughout half the nest and reached the water tower.

I suspect due to the lack of air flow, coupled with high humidity.

[Barristan]

Am I saying that there are no ants that can do well in Acrylics nests? Of course not. For example, look at Ants Canada's Solenopsis.

 

I wonder why you had to make statements like this then (bold part by me):

 

 

These formicariums made of plastic, acrylic, steel... they always look great. But you never see a live thriving colony in them. Always antless. 

 

So you knew about AntsCanada keeping a large ant colony in an acrylic nest and still said that.  Also you asked later for pictures. Why in the first place if you already knew of ant colonies doing fine in these type of nests. Then someone posted pictures and you still had an excuse.

 

 

Some of you who live in Germany can only dream of having such an amazing and wonderful ant - as you watch AC's video drooling to every frame with lust and envy. 

 

What has this to do with the question if ant colonies can do fine in plastic, acrylic nests, or not? By the way if I really wanted these ants to badly I would order them online and within one week I would have them and could legally keep them. No need for dreaming here. But I don't want, I'm quite happy with the ant colonies I have and don't want to increase the number.

 

Sharing own experience is good and enriches this hobby, but claiming things that aren't true (like never seen any living ant colony in acrylic/plastic nests) is not.

Edited by Barristan, September 19 2018 - 2:59 AM.

[dspdrew]

I have a 6-year-old Veromessor pergandei colony of thousands living in a nest made of epoxy resin, polystyrene and unglazed tile. I also even have a colony of Myrmecocystus mexicanus living in one of these formicariums as well. This colony is now actually looking more healthy than my huge colony living in the giant glass vase/dirt nest.