r/Antkeeping 🐜

im afraid of cotton balls, what other thing can i use.

Hi! So I have a bioactive enclosure for crickets and mealworms. Was going great, but it was soon invaded by ants. I obviously now cant feed the crickets and mealworms to my other inverts (luckily I have multiple breeding bins) but ive grown a bit fond of the ants and sort of want to make a (somewhat) self containing ecosystem. I obviously cant really remove most of their protein sources, but I was wondering if I could limit sugar in order to control the colony size? I dont want them to eradicate the crickets and mealworms.

I basically have a question about more than one colony sharing the same foraging space? The would have their own nesting spaces sealed away from each other, but when they get to the outworld it would be a shared foraging situation.

Could this work? Or will it just cause issues and I'm setting myself up to fail 🤣

Has anybody seen anything else like this? https://antkeepers.com/collections/formicarium-ant-farms/products/nest-formicarium-ant-farm

Or has anybody here bought this modular nest themselves? I'm interested in getting a nest that I can slowly expand over time.

Hey guys, I’ve got into antkeeping after watching a lot of videos on them and decided to get some. I’m European so one of the first ants that were suggested to me from antshq were European Harvesters. Do you have any advice for me on how to care for these guys well?

I’ve heard they eat seeds, do they eat anything else or only seeds. And what type of terrarium/space should I move them to after a test tube?

Any advice would be great

Thanks:: :)

Is there a specific brand or material I should get in in?

I have Tetramorium Bicarinatum colony, i had 3 queens before but now 2 of them have died, one this week and other one today. I am left with only one queen, and i am scared that she dies too. Workers are dying less (from around 40 only 2 have died within 2 last months and it seems normal). I have suspicions that i put talc wrongly but i don't see any white spots in the outworld.

Pls help, i was keeping them on my desk, they didn't seem stressed or anything, right now i placed them on a different table that no one uses in case it was vibrations. I keept them at around 23 C at night and around 25 when i turned on heating mat. Humidity is around 64% (I know its high but i couldn't lower it). Also i currently turned off heating just in case.

Before dying this queen was stopping in random places for no reason for some time before going back and doing its usual things. I will probably contact the seller soon too because i am very nervous about last queen dying. They have constant water (2 almost full testubes) and air flow too, i don't see mold in their outworld.

I can't provide photos of dead queens or the outworld right now but i will put them in the comments after i take some.

Hi! I started ant keeping this summer, but after about 3-4 months, the queen of my most advanced lasius niger colony started acting weird. It had about 30 workers, and she started escaping the nest, digging through cotton, and after 3 days, she eventually died. She wasn't hungry, she didn't want the maple sirup or the chia seeds I gave her.

So, now, what do I do with the remaining workers? I have some other lasius niger colonies, could I introduce the workers to one? Will they pledge allegiance to the new queen, or will they be a threat?

Thank you for your time

got this colony as a gift from friends - and he couldn't ID it as well

I need help about them like their diets and other stuff

I just got my hands in 2 golden polyrhachis queens. What do I do now? After putting them In a test tube setup they still are not laying eggs. Also, may I know if they are claustral or semi claustral?

Hello, good evening
I found these ants in my bathroom and i would like to know if they are queens ants and what species.

Thak you so much

(here in my country it is spring)

https://preview.redd.it/g7mjxvqtz44e1.jpg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a9b051a82a14086dd1b9bf91a6ee22eb21b92ea3

https://preview.redd.it/yk15cqqtz44e1.jpg?width=1200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=e95bdb41e27f02290d73d0d89ed063df324810e3

I see like brownish oval shaped things moving around the soil but i cant really move them since their also in the nesting space plus the formicarium i have for them is too small, im afraid they might die from it how do i remove it?

Guys, im feeding my ants with mealworm but non of them were out to eat what is the problem ?

So about 3 months ago I got a starter colony of camponatus sanctus from ant farm supplies, for the first two months they seemed to be doing really well, queen was laying eggs and there were around 7 workers, since then 5 of the workers have died, the temperature is around 26° in the day and night it gets colder they always have water and sugar water and they get a dead insect once a week, there are no visible mites or any kind of detritus or anything that looks like it could be a problem The ants aren’t visibly dying or twitching or making weird movements and I just can’t figure out what I’m doing wrong, I’m worried for the queen, what happens if all the workers die? They’re only in a very small ant farm, should I move them back into a test tube for now? If anyone can help me understand what I might be doing wrong I would greatly appreciate it.