Just caught 4 ant queens

[eelnoob]

Just wondering what are some good foods to feed them and how deep should the substrate be, or should I just leave container bare for now?




Any inputs/ideas will be greatly appreciated.

 

[arachnocat]

Nice! We need to what kind of ants you found, as different species have slightly different diets. Most ants seem to like sweets (honey, maple syrup, etc), so you can try a little bit of that on a cottonball or soak it in sugar water that till you figure out the species. It can be difficult to ID ants sometimes though. Can you post some pics?
Also you could try this website: http://antfarm.yuku.com/
Lots of good info there.

 

[syndicate]

if u found mated queens you dont need to feed them until the first workers emerge.u can set up each queen individually in a vial and she will lay eggs for ya.check this forum for more help on keeping ants
http://antfarm.yuku.com/bantfarm

*edit
oops just realized u posted that same link :X

 

[josh_r]

i have kept many ant colonies. new queens dont necessarily need to eat, but it doesnt hurt to feed her. ants dont do very well on a diet of sugar water and syrup or other sweets. they need protiens and other crap. if you are interested in ants and the keeping of ants, check out a book called

'journey to the ants' by bert holldobler.

this book has an entire section on the keeping of ants and has an excellent recipe for ant food.

speaking of ants, i found a colony of slave making ants over the weekend. this is an odd sight as the slave making ants are red and the species they have made slaves is black..... so you have a colony of ants that is red and black.... wierd to see them mixed running around all spastic.

 

[Villosa]

What I do with a newly mated queen is to first hydrate her with a moist cottonball, sometimes with sugar water to get her going a bit. While she is drinking, I'll go and set up her nest for colony founding. I usually use a test tube with a diameter of about 3/4" or larger. Any round or cubed container that's small would work but with a test tube you get the added resourse of providing water. What I do is fill the tube all the way with water and pack a very tight ball of cotton to about 1" from the tube's bottom. This will ensure available moisture, thus providing humidity and avoiding dessication. I'll then pack soil high in clay into the tube to provide her with a very natural feel and something to dig, something I've noticed that they must do in order to be truly happy; I've noticed queens dig themselves to death on a piece of plastic bottm so I highly recommend they be given something for digging. I've also noticed that queens love the tight, claustrophobic feel of a tight space. In the end it'll look like this. Good luck, ant keeping is fun and very educational!

From time to time I will unplug the cotton entrance and put a fly into the tube for added protein. Even fully clasutral species will not refuse a good meal like that.