Sam_the_Ants L.Niger colony

[Sam_the_Ant]

Ok so after a long winter, me and my L.nigers have both decided to come out of hibernation and thought it was time to get a journal up and going. This is my very 1st colony, which I have had now since august 2011. I had a beautiful queen (named queeny) who had the biggest bottom I've ever seen and 4 workers, sent from Ants unearthed. They have a very small tank, 30cmx30cm glass, filled with mixed sand and soil, with a couple golf T's as pylons to hold food that rots quickly, so its easy to dispose off! My ants have been very busy, as they have made a massive chamber right underneath the tank, which a few months ago had about 50 eggs inside the chamber, and now we still have 50 eggs there, so have no idea if these eggs are going to change. There is quite abit of activity within the chamber, as I often see the eggs moving from time to time. Put in a mealworm 2 days ago, when I noticed the 1st ant had emerged after winter, and then another 5 or 6 appeared later on in the day to have a spot of lunch in the barren lands of their tank. I have not seen or heard of queeny since before december, so I do not know if she is still alive, let alone making new eggs, but I pray she is, as I do not want my 1st colony to fail. I've had a few escapee's, as I only have a little lid for them, but they always seem to return home... bearing gifts sometimes... kind of like the three wise men... just ofcourse ants... and about 20 of them ;D My ants have an aquired taste for spiders I found out, and also very responsive to when I dampen the soil, they seem to venture out more once I've wetened their homelands. Anyways I shall post more soon, when they hopefully become more active... or my worst fears... extinct.. for which I shall never get another colony LOL.... Sam_the_Ant... and his little minions^^

[Sam_the_Ant]

Ok so in the past month, a lot has happened. We have had a mite infestation, which got me abit worried about the wellfare of my minions. I got some very helpful infomation from members, James, wood ant, bat, and a couple others and this is what I did:

-I took the lid off my formicarium, to ventilate and dry out the soil abit, luckily I do not have more than 100 ants yet!
-Stuck a small slice of lemon in there, (apparently the mites do not like it... it has helped)
-Boiled insects before I put it into the tank to destroy any parasites etc...
-washed and wiped as much of the tank as possible, removed whatever soil which was not being used by the ants and replaced with fresh baked soil, and boiled stones!

Since the lid has been off, the ants have been a lot more active, and have ventured out of the tank, and to my Meal worm mountain, which sits right next to my ant tank.
The ants BROKE IN to the meal worm house, and stole the cheerio's!! my meal worms beatles were not happy, and have since been playing dead for some strange reason (they still move if you poke em)

Amazingly, I was in such hysterics to the ants exploration, I also noticed that they were going back and forth from the tank... so I do not fear that they have escaped, since they will return (I hope) ;D
The ants are reluctant to avoid coming out during the day time, but very active in the evenings when they know its feeding time probably.

I can see lots of cocoons in the main chamber, along with fresh eggs from the looks of things.
Lots of ant movement, and stock rotation of the eggs... ants would work so well in supermarkets I tell you!!

So far my ants have come along way, queeny seems to still be producing, and the summer is almost upon us. I am currently working on a way to move the ants from the 30cmx30cm tank, to a much larger formicarium. But issues of the ants already being settled in the soil, it will be a hard process to transfer them.

Anyways, more updates soon^^
Sam and his cheerio thiefs!!

[Sam_the_Ant]

So the ants are getting more and more active, lots of foraging ants and many in the hive, working the egg rotation. I gave them a fizzy cola bottle which they seemed to swarm over, and also a shreddie (cereal) which they also seemed to chew through.

Today I have received the new materials for making my new ant nest for these Lasius nigers. 10x A4 clear acrylic sheets with 3mm width. Tubing so I can connect things together (haven't decided yet) Lots of soil, and PTFE to stop them from escaping. This project is going to take a few weeks to make , and think its going to be massive, but the more space, the better I'm guessing ;D

Also I'm going to work on maybe sticking a waterfall/pond in here, but depending on how I make the tank, this may not happen because of health and safety regulations of the ants. With 2 islands being separated by the water, a bridge that goes over to the foraging food area. I'm thinking of real plants, grass, trees.
I do hope this works out really well, and will post some pictures up shortly of my progress.

As for the ants, I need to find how I am going to transfer them over once I have made the tank, feel free to post any suggestions.

Wish me luck

[batspiderfish]

Just let the original nest dry out once it is connected to your new set up.

[Sam_the_Ant]

The L.Nigers are currently hard at work in the hive, maybe about 60-70eggs, and then a seperate chamber for cocoons which I cannot see them all, but there is a lot of them.
They seem to frequently get out of the tank, despite my best efforts to stop them with PTFE fluid, oil and washing up liquid, and venture out to their neighbours "the mealworms".
But on the plus side of them escaping, they always do return and luckily they do not bite.

I've started putting in live spiders to observe how ants react to danger or potential food, and its fascinating to watch how they actually hunt. Watching them closely, 1 or 2 ants is just not enough to take down a big spider, but when there is about 15-20 workers, is when you start to see the tactics.

Each Ant will ultimately try to disarm/prevent the foe from escaping, by holding each leg down in place. When the ants finally have it halted, others seem to climb onto it, and start probing it in places with its antenna, which is peculiar. Then they will start nawing at different parts on the creature, which very much aggrivates it into a frenzy.
So when people say "numbers do not win battles" I highly have to disagree as this shows that numbers do seriously help, and size is not always everything

In total the L.Niger colony seems to be flourishing. I've almost had them for 1 year now, and they are still not in their prime. Still waiting to transfer them into a new habitat, which I hope I can figue out how to move them without damaging them, as the tank they are in is a glass fish tank, and has soil inside where they can dig.

Thanks for reading again, and new update soon

[Sam_the_Ant]

So with the colony reaching a bigger size, I decided it was time to add some more soil to this nest to keep it busy. I used Sand/loam mixture from ants unearthed which I have never used before, and it seems to be a hit with my ants.

After the 1st day of them scouting the new soil, and hole that I put in to get them started, they had all moved from the original soil nest into the new sand/loam mixture. All the brood and queen was quickly rushed across the landscape into the new nest, and they got to work straight away.

Within days they have dug deep to the very bottom of the tank, and made a few chambers from which I can see lots of pupae in, and the nurses tending to them. The ants seem to be a lot more active since I have used this soil, which I find quite strange, as the soil I used before was from in my garden and mixed with a bit of sand. So I'm not quite sure why they prefer this new stuff, but aslong as my ants are happy who cares.

I have been seeing a lot of people posting about brood boosting, and thought I would give this ago. So I found a nest in my garden which is crawling with hundreds of nests of L.nigers, took about 60 pupae and put them in a pile in my tank. It was not long til my ants found them and seemed abit confused as to why the eggs were there, or maybe they could smell another ant colonys scent on them, I'm not too sure. But surely after about 5mins of probing, they started gathering all of the pupae up, and taking them back into the main nest.

After a few days I've noticed the ants have been bringing these cocoons back to the foraging area and are burying them under a rock, and turns out that they are empty cases which hopefully a new ant has come out of, and hasnt just been eaten by the others.

Overall the ants at the moment are still doing fantasticly and are on the increase as always, which I hope the queen is still in her prime and producing lots of eggs!
They are fed mainly a diet of house spiders and chocolate. ;D

[Sam_the_Ant]

Currently this nest is just booming with ants. Most the the brood that I boosted this colony with, have all been born, with only a few left to go, or maybe they are from my own queen producing.
They have dug all over the place, with lots of new tunnels and other chambers which seem to be in progress.

I have not seen the queen as she is in the soil, and hopefully she is still doing well, and has not been killed by the ants I boosted this colony with. But still there is a steady supply of cocoons which is still a very good sign I guess. ;D

The ants have moved some cocoons to the other end of the tank, where the old nest used to be, not sure as to why they are doing this, but they are all nice and cosy from the looks of things.

I did feed the ants a gall wasp just before I went on holiday, and the only thing that remained was the outer case of the wasp. All the abdomen and the other juicy parts had been completely munched on. And I regularly feed my ants spiders, which do not last very long, as they are pulled down to the core of the hive, and the legs deposited outside the nest once they have finished.

My L.Nigers are crafty little buggers, and always seem to escape, despite my efforts to keep them in the tank. They know how to get past the PTFE solution and then past the tanks lid, but they enjoy a nice wonder round my bedroom, and eventually return back home after a good scout of my bonsai tree which they frantically like to climb.

All in all, my L.Nigers are just doing far greater than I expected, and can't wait to find out what else happens in the next month.

[Sam_the_Ant]

So I've fed my ants today a few small spiders, and also tried them on a "Minstrel" to see what they thought of it... And apparently it was a hit with them! They were crawling over it in seconds and seem to still be enjoying it. Here's a really bad photo of them;



Also I was not sure if my queen (AKA Queeny) was ok, until ealier I saw some larvae in one of the big chambers! which hopefully is a fantastic sign that she is still fine, and producing a lot.



And last but not least, these lovely cocoons seem to be a beautiful white colour, which I'm hoping is a healthy sign. The ants seem to stack them at the side of the tank, and then will keep moving them back and forth throughout the nest, which is strange... Possibly a change in humidity, I'm not quite sure. Anyways sorry for poor quality photo's! hope you enjoy seeing the 1st pictures of my 1st colony

[Wood~Ant]

Perfectly healthy brood from what I can see on your pics Sam

[Sam_the_Ant]

I'm so happy with this colony. I started out with basically a queen and a few workers, and now its turned into a thriving hive. Its only been a year since I've had them, and they always seem to make me smile and still amaze me to half the things they do. One ant even went flying the other day.

The tank they are in could probably use a lot more soil, since they seem to have dug basically everything else. The queen is just popping eggs out like mad... I'd feel very sorry for her if she was human hehe.

They do some strange behaviour, like go and sit on the sides of the tanks, and do not really move, which I find strange. And then sometimes, all the workers come up to the surface of the hill, and sit there just cleaning themselves and do not really move. Not sure why this is, but it certainly has me guessing.

I make sure that the nest is kept nice and moist, and the ants do not mind being misted, which makes my life a little easier without hormonal girls trying to kill me. They love spiders still, and seem to be getting more and more confident as the colony grows.

I put a crane fly in the other day, one ant grabbed it by the foot and clinged on for dear life... as the crane fly fought it was fun to try and fly out of the tank. Was pretty amusing to watch an ant fly, but I think she may have second thoughts about tackleing craneflys again ;D

I've got the heating on currently, as its cold outside, but the ants have moved all of the cocoons into some of the tunnels, which is peculiar, as this does see daylight, and normally are only used so the ants can travel to and from the chambers to the surface. Heres a few pics.





So yes the ants are doing fantastic, but its a shame that autumn is almost here... they shall be heading to sleep in a few months. But on the plus side, I have a thriving colony, and the queen is still producing, which has really put a massive smile on my face.

Thanks for reading... more pics and updates soon

[Sam_the_Ant]

Its that time of year again... when me and the ants come out of hibernation

The weather has been very mild recently, so I decided to bring the L.Nigers in after 3 months of hibernation. I had noticed that there had not been any activity over the winter. Lots of the entrances had been blocked off, and the ants had moved all of the cocoons deeper into the nest where it was warmer.

When I looked directly underneath the tank into the main chamber, I could see all the ants huddled in one group, sitting on top of the eggs and Larvae. I didnt know that ants did this and was really beautiful to see.
After about 10 minutes they all began to become active, lots of them were twitching when coming into contact with other ants. I'm not sure if thats normal, but guess it must be.

And shortly after this, I had lots of ants searching the main arena area. Its just suprising how quickly these ants became active, and instinctivly got right to work. Pulling the dirt out of the tunnels, lots of ants searching for food and water. Also when I tried to feed them live food as I always have, these ants instead of attacking like they used to in the summer, just paniced and ran off. Maybe because these are a younger generation, but I'm not too sure.

They still know how to escape from the tank, and was not long til the little buggers started invading my bedroom in search of whatever they wanted.

This is my 1st ever colony, and it has been going for 2 and a half years, which I am so pleased that they have not failed. I cannot wait to see what productions and other info they can teach me this year. Ants truely are an amazing creature!

Updates and photo's as they progress this year