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Post by bobdol on Sept 6, 2011 16:04:50 GMT
Today I received a healthy colony of Messor Barbarus from Wood ant/Jenant. This was the Q1 Queen and currently she has around 15+ workers with lots of brood in different stages.
At the moment they are housed in a small collecting bottle with some soil but should soon be moved to a Ytong nest that I am planning on making. The nest should be done by the end of the weekend as I have to wait for my Ant Store delivery to arrive before starting on the nest.
After carefully opening the the tub I placed some Sunflower and Niger seeds into the nest and before I could get the lid closed a worker was already biting and dragging the seed ;D
Will update as soon as possible thanks!
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Post by bobdol on Sept 7, 2011 17:35:09 GMT
The messors seem to have settled in well and have removed all the soil to one side of the nest sitting on the plastic which seems strange as I would of expected them too be more comfortable sitting on the more natural soil rather than plastic. However I now have I great view of the brood as they are nestled directly on the plastic They also ignored the sunflower seeds although I can understand this as the seeds are about 6 times the size of the minor workers Although, they dragged all the smaller niger seeds over to the brood and queen. When I observed the nest later there was a pile of waste which I'm guessing is the left overs of some of the niger seeds. They don't seem to be interested in sugar water soaked tissue but did love the piece of meal worm I dropped in earlier ;D About 3 workers grabbed it and dragged it over too the brood where they munched on it for a bit, after about 20 minutes the queen nicked it off them and is now gorging on meal worm her self
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Post by bobdol on Sept 9, 2011 17:02:00 GMT
Sadly around 5 workers have been removed from this colony over the last 2 days. There was some sort of illness which (touch wood) seems to have gone... The tub is now in a larger foraging box which will soon be attached to a ytong nest which they will hopefully adopt as their home. There has been no foraging although they have hollowed out the mealworm leaving only the husk and have munched a few seeds. There are currently 2 workers that remain alive from the 5, I do not hold high hopes for them to recover although they will be replaced if they make a recovery from their current state They both have water and a seed in their tube for some nutrients
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Post by bobdol on Sept 14, 2011 17:50:21 GMT
This colony is doing ok now although they still will not leave the tub and barely forage... (although they did eat a fly I dropped in yesterday) One of the Media workers is seeming ill and has been outside the tub by himself for 2 days now There is still 2-3 pupae , a batch of eggs and around 10-15 larvae in different sizes so I have high hopes. Although the worker count is only at around 7 now as they seem to die off I can only hope they bounce back when they get in the new ytong nest
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Post by bobdol on Sept 30, 2011 17:07:42 GMT
Well... I moved the colony into a large ytong nest a couple of days back which they seemed to like at first... However, yesterday the workers and queen were seperated with the brood all over the place I woke up this morning to find one worker dead which brought the count down too 2 after 1 died a few days ago however, the good news is one pupa did eclose yesterday bringing the count up too 3. I have moved them out of the ytong nest now and have placed them in a testtube with the remainder of the brood as, sadly lots of larvae dried out in the nest as the colony would not move the brood up too the wet part of the nest. Hopefully they can regain their strength in the test tube where I can keep an eye on them.
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Post by Jenny on Sept 30, 2011 18:45:58 GMT
Soil set up, this species likes to dig
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Post by bobdol on Sept 30, 2011 18:53:39 GMT
Yes, I think I will try a soil set up once the colony gets a bit bigger or at least a ytong set up that can be watered effectivley
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Post by TenebrousNova on Oct 1, 2011 9:46:07 GMT
I would advise you to introduce them into a soil set up soon, because one of my own queens was doing terribly until I gave her one- and she now has about 16-17 workers from just 5.
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Post by Black Ant on Oct 1, 2011 16:03:15 GMT
Many ants don't like artificial nests, and as they live in soil and like to dig it makes sense to put them in soil or they might die off in other set ups
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Post by bobdol on Oct 1, 2011 17:06:09 GMT
I think I will buy a tank of some sort... Anyone know something cheap that is suitable for ants?
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Post by Wood~Ant on Oct 1, 2011 17:12:25 GMT
I think I will buy a tank of some sort... Anyone know something cheap that is suitable for ants? I keep some of my ants in these} Ant Tanks which are perfect as all you have to do is glue some wire mesh under the lid to make them more escape proof
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Post by bobdol on Oct 1, 2011 19:04:01 GMT
Well I've just checked on them and a 4th worker is eclosing... The brood does not look so healthy though as the pupae and larvae seem to have "shrunk" I will leave them in the tube for a while as its a large one with an a large supply of sugar water + some seeds at the far end. Its in the airing cupboard which is dark and warm so, I think they will be best off here for a while as they have everything they need. Once the queen lays some more eggs I will start thinking about a new set up I think I think the problem with my last ytong nest was that the water supply was not set up properly and so most of the nest was bone dry... I have made two more now and they seem to get better everytime as I've worked out a much better water reservoir technique in which the water flows all through the back of the concrete, a bit like some of the ants canada nests.
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Post by bobdol on Oct 5, 2011 17:25:50 GMT
Checking on the colony today I was very happy too see a new batch of eggs, only 4-5 but I'm sure more are on the way Sadly though it seems the 4th worker did not eclose although the callow is now dark black and I cannot tell her apart from the others.
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Post by bobdol on Oct 13, 2011 16:39:20 GMT
At the moment there is around 10-20 eggs in a big batch, the 3 workers and queen all seem healthy as well. They have been eating some protein and lots of sugar water but do not seem interested in seeds anymore
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Post by bobdol on Oct 29, 2011 16:58:52 GMT
The egg pile is now a large pile of small larvae all at around the same stage of development. The colony has not shown much interest in any insect food only munching for a little while and then leaving it to be finished by the Phiedole's. They have made some antbread out of some seeds I placed in their though! All 3 workers seem fine although I have noticed 1 has a small indent in its abdomen but this does not seem to affect it at all. I will try them on some chicken tonight as from what I can see from people's experience with this species they love chicken ;D
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