I accidentally acquired an ant colony

[RezonantVoid]

I have no idea how but a colony of Camponatus Nigriceps moved into an unused container in my cupboard without me even realising.


There was literally nothing but 15mm of dry cocopeat and spider web inside, so i have no idea why they decided to move in lol


I guess ill be rewatching alot of antscanada videos now, but ill welcome any tips from ant keepers on here

 

[mantisfan101]

It’s a lot to explain but I highly recommend antsaustralia instead since he has a nigriceps colony as well. Try to move them all into a test tube setup for now whcih is basically a test tube and some water in it which is blocked off with some cotton that acts like a dam. Once the colony’s moved in try placing them in a foraging area ie. a platic container or anywhere they can forage in. Use fluon or rubbing alcohol mixed with baby powder to create a slippery barrier that the ants won’t be able to climb. Looking at the size of your colony, I think you might be able to move them into a formicarium which is basically a fancier way of saying ant farm. Antsaustralia has some amazing ytong and acrylic nests so go check them out. Feed them chopped up insects and some source of sugar via honey, sugar water, etc. There’s a whole lot more to explain but I highly recommend checking out AntsAustralia’s video in sugar ants aka camponotus.

 

[RezonantVoid]

From what ive gathered from ants Australia it sounds like these guys like a quite sugary diet so ive provided them with a small tub of maple syrup (i spied them drinking a spilled drop of it on our kitchen bench after some waffles the other night), but also gave them a prekilled cricket which they did put to use after a bit of time. Considering they normally live in logs i guess that explains why they chose the cocopeat so ill probably continue to keep them in there and attach them to a larger outworld in a week or so as there is a sizeable workforce and quite alot of brood. Not gonna lie, one of very few polymorphic colonies ive seen as most of the species i see in the wild have only minor workers, so thats pretty cool. And thank the heavens they have no stingers as most of the local species will have you rolling in agony in seconds

 

[Arthroverts]

That's pretty awesome. I was about to say I wish that would happen to me, but then I realized that with the species we have where I live and the amount of empty enclosures I have laying around (very few, just removed a bunch that were taking up space), I'd end up with a good portion of my collection dead first.

Thanks for sharing,

Arthroverts

 

[mantisfan101]

You can always wait for nuptial flights which is when the queens and males emerge and mate.

 

[RezonantVoid]

Nuptial flight season is still going down here so im hoping this is a fresh colony.

 

[mantisfan101]

Did you actually see the queen in this colony? Also if you mean a fresh colony as in a newly established colony, this colony is definitely at least a year old. It takes some time for a queen to establish a colony and with larger species like camponotus, it can take almost 2 years for them to have around 20+ workers.

 

[Bob Lee]

Ants are pretty simple to take care of, you might want to move them to a container with some "clean space" or connect an outworld to it. This way you can provide honey water without it getting stuck to everything.
You can also feed them some seed, campos are just weird and sometimes they decide to be harvester ants instead.

 

[RezonantVoid]

Did you actually see the queen in this colony? Also if you mean a fresh colony as in a newly established colony, this colony is definitely at least a year old. It takes some time for a queen to establish a colony and with larger species like camponotus, it can take almost 2 years for them to have around 20+ workers.

Just saw the queen now. Theres probably 50+ workers including a handful of majors, and lots of eggs/pupae

 

[mantisfan101]

Ants are pretty simple to take care of, you might want to move them to a container with some "clean space" or connect an outworld to it. This way you can provide honey water without it getting stuck to everything.
You can also feed them some seed, campos are just weird and sometimes they decide to be harvester ants instead.

Apparently they seem to really enjoy spiders as well.

 

[RezonantVoid]

Apparently they seem to really enjoy spiders as well.

I noted that as well, perhaps why they chose to move in despite the spider silk making an outworld for them this afternoon

 

[RezonantVoid]

Update: their syrup tub somehow tipped over just now (they have been excavating under it but not using it) and a small amount soaked some of the brood. I have immediately added tissues to soak it up and removed the tub but i figure i need to get them out ASAP and into a proper setup. I have everything worked out but would it be appropriate to tip them carefully into a temporary container while i setup their proper home, and then tip them back into the outworld and let them burrow? Outworld will be connected to the main chamber kind of like an AC ant tower, with the main container full of substrate and connected at the bottom so they can dig across the bottom and upwards. Will drill a few tiny holes in the bottom on one side and sit this in a dish so that water csn be added manually. Does this idea sound okay?

 

[mantisfan101]

Sounds ok but I highly suggest getting some sort of formicarium as you won’t be able to perform maintenance on the colony without bothering them. You need to find a way to hydrate them and misting the whole colony is not really a good idea.

 

[RezonantVoid]

I have holes drilled into th

Sounds ok but I highly suggest getting some sort of formicarium as you won’t be able to perform maintenance on the colony without bothering them. You need to find a way to hydrate them and misting the whole colony is not really a good idea.

I will hopefully get a fornicarium as soon as possible, but most of them seem very pricey so im just trying to make do for now until i can buy them one. Soaked tissue in a dish in their outworld will be used for water and i will replace it every 2 days, thats how i hydrate my feeders and ive never had any issues but will see how i go. Their main chamber will sit in a dish that i can pour water into and i have some activated charcoal at the bottom so it filters out any chemicals from the already filtered water

 

[RezonantVoid]

I somehow managed to get them in without damaging the brood and looks they have gone straight for the tower, heres the setup (i put the cork bark in the tower and added honey and sugar water dishes to the outworld after) and a terrible photo of a minor feeding the queen



But damn my fluon must have expired because even 3 layers of it did NOTHING to stop them lol

 

[mantisfan101]

Looks good so far and I think you need to reapply it almost every, if not every other day.

 

[RezonantVoid]

Looks good so far and I think you need to reapply it almost every, if not every other day.

Ill definitely do that as admittedly i had to hand catch a number of escapees

After their first night, they decided maple syrup is now the enemy and buried it with soil lol


So far it seems they like their digging medium at least

 

[mantisfan101]

I know that some species of ants will cover their food with bits of detritus so that it soaks up the secretion and they’ll bring it back to the colony to share it with others, but this only applies for some species like Aphaemogaster which has no social stomach. They could be hiding it for now to disguise it from other competing ants.

 

[Bob Lee]

Update: their syrup tub somehow tipped over just now (they have been excavating under it but not using it) and a small amount soaked some of the brood.

Exact reason why I said you should have some clean space

 

[RezonantVoid]

Exact reason why I said you should have some clean space

This was before i added their outworld, but i can definitely see the benefits of having a seperate open area