my other Lasius colony (big photos.)

[markm]

Here are a few snaps of them from today. They have been moving the cocoons part way into the tube that connects the nest to the foraging area. Maybe to get the cocoons more heat? They move them back into the nest shortly after I turn the heat lamp off. Here is a gathering of the workers and queen.

[formica]

Hi markm, your Lasius niger colony is doing this as in the morning they move their brood to the surface to warm them.When you turn your heat lamp off it is like it becomes night time so they take them deep inside the nest to make sure they do not get too cold.Then when you turn your light on they bring them back up to warm them on the surface and the queen may do this too as she might be cold.

[markm]

Here are some recent pictures. Since moving the nest to face the heat lamp better they have stopped moving the cocoons into the tube connecting the nest to the foraging area. Also it seems like now they forage more at night or at least when I turn the heat amp off. I don't think the heat is to much for them as they have moved the cocoons into the chamber closest to the light. I suspect to give the cocoon as much heat as possible. This colony grows bigger daily it seems and is well over 50 works strong.

This is a shot of all the cocoons in a side chamber as close to the light as they can get within the nest.



And this is the main chamber they use and where the queen is almost always found.

[Wood~Ant]

A nice colony with lots of very healthy pupae. They seem to like the plaster nest you have them in Mark

[markm]

It's actually ytong.

[Wood~Ant]

Jul 27, 2009 19:35:06 GMT markm said:

It's actually ytong.

Do you have any special method for keeping the set up damp, or is it dry? From the photo it looks dry, but aerated concrete will hold a certain amount of moisture, so I wondered if you sit it in water from time to time or have a wick system

[markm]

I did some modifications to this once I had finished it to this point. The blue cup was to small to really soak up enough water and the heat pad caused to much condensation so I basically took off the heating pad and carved around that area to create a bigger spot for a larger water reservoir. I keep the reservoir filled with water and it keeps about 1/5 of the nest damp.

[Quah]

I must say that the way you guys have your ant keeping set up makes me into a novice.

My set up are usually just a plain transparent plastic container with some soft tissue paper or sponge to retain moisture in the nest.

Again I must consider myself very lucky seeing that there is no need for me to maintain temperature for my nest and I get ants all year round not having a winter season here. The only slight downside is the annual dry spell when it is not ideal time for collecting or hunting ants in the wild. Even then an occasional downpour will sometimes still bring out very interesting alates.