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Post by kalistes on May 11, 2011 22:04:52 GMT
I have two colonies of these amazing ants, both arrived about a month ago. Colony no. 1 has a black headed queen and around 15 workers. No sign of any majors yet, but they are in a soil nest, so anything could be happening down there! Colony no. 2 has a red headed queen and 3 very large larvae, plus a amall pile of eggs. I'm hoping for her first workers soon. For colony one I wanted t try something different. I have kept Messors before, and have always struggled to get the substrate at the correct consistency, and maintain the correct degree of moisture. I know they like it dry, but I have kept them TOO dry in the past. This has resulted in tunnel collapses and dead colonies!  This time I created a series of caverns using two large pieces of flat blue slate, separated with small pieces around the edges to create a "natural" cave. Any gaps were packed tightly with soil. A whole series of these caverns have been carefully put together, meaning that the ants can add or remove as much soil as they like, but the slate should remain in place, creating a nice stable "ceiling". I will try and get some pictures of this being put together for my next colony. A few desert plants (cacti and succulents) were added, mainly to help bind the sandy soil together even more. Finally, a layer of sand, grit and fine gravel, as well as a few interesting pebbles were added to the surface. Heating is provided with a 60 watt lamp which keeps the surface temperature at around 25 degrees (I may work on altering this in the future). The messors moved in straight away, and as I stated in another post, promptly vanished for several weeks! Eventually I got really worried and dug away a few small pebbles from the entrance hole. Since then a steady stream of workers has been collecting the (dandelion!) seeds left out for them. ;D |
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Post by kalistes on May 13, 2011 17:59:56 GMT
found a lot of dandelion seed-heads while walking the dog this morning, so I've just been checking them for mites and preparing them for the black-headed nest. They took a cricket last night (they ignored it at first, but it was gone this morning so I assume they took it under cover of darkness. As stated by other members, this species seems quite shy in these early stages. The red headed queen is still doing ok, although no workers yet.  please post questions and comments on my ant journals here} queenant.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=nativecomment&action=display&thread=4679 |
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Post by kalistes on May 17, 2011 4:13:24 GMT
I put dozens of dandelion seeds in the black headed colony yesterday, and every one of them has gone this morning, so there's certainly some activity in there. They still have little interest in insect prey (or crickets anyway). I had to remove a dead cricket yesterday and put it in with the rubras (who are always hungry) to stop it going to waste.
A small amount of interest has been shown in the fresh mango, which I've put in on two occasions. Grapes are ignored completely.
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Post by kalistes on May 18, 2011 4:13:13 GMT
some good news! The red headed queen looks like she will have her first worker anytime soon  . A nice sized pupae is clearly visible amongst the small pile of brood and eggs. I will hopefully be able to start adding food to her test tube soon ;D Two or three workers are regularly out looking for food in the black headed enclosure (rather than the single worker seen up to now), so hopefully this is an indication of population growth in this colony  |
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Post by kalistes on May 25, 2011 4:49:34 GMT
Still no sign of a worker from the red-headed queen, although she now has seven plump little larvae and what looks like a small pupae. There are also a couple of eggs, but I assume that she is holding off laying any more to conserve her energy. It must take so much out of a new queen to found a colony purely on her own reseves of protein.
I added a few dandelion seeds the other day, and she has gathered them up by the looks of it, but I'm not sure if she will actually eat anything.
The black-headed queen still has a couple of workers foraging on the surface at all times. They completely ignore the crickets that I put in, and most seeds as well, concentrating on dandelion seeds. I will try them with a bit of variety next week, since I am going to order some fruit flies and curly-winged flies from Dartfrog.
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Post by kalistes on Jun 3, 2011 4:46:03 GMT
Not much to report here. The black-headed colony has barricaded itself in again (after collecting a lot of seeds up), and the red-headed queen still has plenty of brood but no workers yet. Shouldn't be long now though (fingers crossed ;D)
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Post by kalistes on Jun 14, 2011 9:33:43 GMT
The black-headed colony have thoroughly sealed the entrance to the nest again, although I've noticed that the dandelion seeds that I put in on an evening disappear over night, so they are still sneaking out! ;D
Still no workers in the red-headed queens nest, although she still looks nice and healthy, and is tending to her plump little brood. I've raised the temperature very slightly to hopefully speed the developement up a bit, and I put in a small dandelion seed (don't know if she will eat it, but it's there just in case)
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Post by kalistes on Jul 3, 2011 15:30:15 GMT
Sadly the red-headed queen was found dead this morning she never did manage to raise a worker to adulthood despite my best efforts. The black-headed colony is still going strong though. I only ever see one or two workers on the surface, but all seeds disappear overnight (they are taking mixed canary/finch seeds now as well as dandelion seeds). They still seem to show no interest in insect prey, but I'm hoping that this changes as the colony grows. I'm going to try them with as big a variety as I can while insects are so abundant. |
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Post by kalistes on Jul 4, 2011 17:56:10 GMT
Processed turkey! this is what messors love apparently ;D after trying for months to get them to eat crickets, flies, worms, woodlice (!!!) etc. A few tiny bits of turkey and no less than 30 workers erupt on the surface  This is a huge increase in their population. I quickly threw in a few seeds and these were also snapped up in a jiffy. On a slightly amusing note, I noticed that two enterprising messors had cut out the middle man by leaving the nest, travelling a foot or so away and raiding the seed pot directly  |
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Post by kalistes on Jul 25, 2011 4:30:20 GMT
Checked the colony first thing this morning to find lots of workers (including three or four medias) collecting the seeds that I left out last night. Canary and finch seeds are now readily taken (so no more early morning trips picking dandelions!). They are also showing a lot more interest in crickets, with two being taken last week  |
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Post by kalistes on Aug 15, 2011 15:36:15 GMT
These guys are continuing to thrive! I give them a good pinch of seeds each day, (which quickly vanish). They are also sneaking out at night and taking seeds directly from the seed pot (a few feet away) which I don't mind while the colony is still fairly small.
Still to see a major (or super major) but lots of minors and a few medias, which is more sucess than I've had in the past.
These ants are in a sandy/soil set up, with lots of different grades of sand, a few rocks and a couple of cactus plants (the roots help hold the soil together).
They also have lots of peices of flat slate buried in the soil to help prevent to much collapse of chambers, since they are kept fairly dry. The only heating is a 40 watt bulb above the tank.
They will now tackle any seeds and insects that I put in, but would only eat dandelion seeds initially.
(the above is added for new members keeping this species)
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Post by kalistes on Mar 11, 2012 5:23:29 GMT
well, it seems that the messors have now woken up from their winter sleep. I "upped" the temperature in the room a little and the tank was suddenly full of workers doing their spring cleaning and collecting a pile of fresh seeds.
Really pleased this colony has survived ;D
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