Hi, my name’s Jordan, and in this video I’ll be sharing with you some methods on
how to raise up a healthy ant colony.
I’ll be starting from the moment when your queen ant has achieved its first generation
of worker ants and going from there.
If you haven’t yet acquired a queen ant or you need some guidance on how to care for
one, go back and watch these videos first.
So in order to keep your colony healthy and promote their growth, a well balances diet,
consisting of both carbohydrates and protein rich foods, is really important.
Here I’m feeding this Technomyrmex sp. colony their very first meal.
Initially, I like to provide my colonies with some sugary foods in order to energize the
ants.
I find a tiny drop of honey or a little bit of fruit to be readily accepted.
Ants actually have two different stomachs, their personal stomach, from which they feed,
and their social stomach, from which they use to feed other members of their colony.
They do this by performing a process known as trophallaxis, similar to how a mother bird
regurgitates food for its young.
In this way all the ants can remain fed, even those who never leave the nest like the queen
and young worker ants.
Once the ants have had their sugar fix, I then provide them with some protein.
Protein is an essential nutrient for the growth of the larvae and the fertility of the queen/s.
For young colonies like this Pheidole sp. one here, I’ll give them small arthropods
like spiders and cockroaches or nuts, seeds and occasionally even bits of meat like chicken
and fish.
I like to assist the ants in consumption by breaking the food up a bit.
Here I’ve crushed up some various nuts into fine bits, which the ants can easily pick
up and carry back to their larvae.
And here, I’ve pulled this spider apart so the workers immediately have access to
the rich juices within. It's good practice to have the food placed on a bit of foil or baking paper.
Any small bits of food left around the nest may promote harmful mold and bacteria growth.
So, this just makes it easier to remove any uneaten food later on.
I often find colonies will love a certain food I give them, but if that same food is
continually provided to them, they begin to reject it.
So, it's a good idea to provide your ants with a variety of different foods.
Different species of ants will prefer different types of food, so do a bit of experimenting,
mix up their diet and find out which foods they enjoy most.
Some species will have more specialized diets than others.
Leaf cutter ants for example are herbivorous, using leaf clipping to create fungus gardens
in which they then exclusively consume.
Harvester ants are known to collect and store seeds, in which they break down and eat later.
And some species of ants tend to aphids, extracting and consuming honeydew which the aphids secrete.
So it's a good idea to identify the species, or at least the genus of ant it is that you’re
trying to raise, to get a good sense of what's best for them.
You’ll need to be a little careful about the food you provide for your colony.
Arthropods may have potentially been exposed to pesticides.
So, I only collect them from places I know haven't been sprayed and pick ones that look
to be in good health.
Then, before feeding them to my colonies, I’ll either boil or freeze them.
Taking this precaution kills any potentially harmful mites, parasites and fungi the arthropod
may have been carrying.
This is also a more humane way of going about the feeding process.
When they’re boiled, they die almost instantly and suffer far less stress and pain than if
you were to feed them living to your ants.
Offering live prey is unnecessary, as most ants will gladly accept pre killed food.
The ants may also find it hard to bring down prey while it’s struggling for its life,
and sometimes injure themselves in the process.
I'm currently looking after just one ant colony, which doesn’t require too much food.
So I just go out and collect a few arthropods from my garden every couple of days.
But, if you're looking after a few colonies, it might be a good idea to buy some feeders
from your local pet store.
You'll often find they sell mealworms and crickets.
Mealworms are a great choice, as they are really easy to look after.
Just get a small tub and fill it with some oats, grains and bits of vegetables as a source
of hydration.
They can last you long time and are great food for your ants.
When the colony starts to fill up the tube, I find this to be a good time to introduce
them to an outworld.
This area will be where food is placed for the ants to forage for and where they will
dispose of their dead and food debris.
I use small acrylic fish tanks and tupperware containers as my outworlds.
Before introducing the ants you'll want to bore a hole or two into the sides.
These small circular holes will be used to attach up tubes, allowing you to easily relocate
the colony later on.
This is best done with a drill, although, you can use a knife, or a pair of scissors.
Just take care you don't cut yourself.
Next you’ll need to make the outworld escape proof.
I find fluon to be the best means of containing your ants.
Just apply a thin layer all the way around the upper inner edges.
When dry, the surface becomes slippery and prevents the ants from being able to crawl
out.
Apply it evenly in a circular motion and make sure you don’t leave any gaps in the barrier.
I also like to wipe the surrounding area of the container with diluted vinegar once every
week or so.
This has a few purposes, ants tend to avoid walking across vinegar, so, for one it acts
as a backup if the ants manage to find a weakness in the barrier of fluon, it also discourages
wild colonies from entering the outworld and invading your colony, which has actually happened
to one of my colonies in the past.
And finally, vinegar is acidic, often used as a natural cleaning agent, so you get the
added benefit of keeping the area clean as well.
To introduce the ants, simply place the tube inside and use some blu-tack or clay to secure
it to the floor.
As the colony grows in size you can gradually up their food intake and begin adding in more
test tube setups, acting as additional nesting chambers.
You can then continue on raising the colony in this simplistic and yet effective way,
adding in more tubes and attaching up further outworlds.
However, after a few tubes have filled up with ants, I like to move them into a more
attractive looking setup, with pre made tunnels and a glass screen for ideal observation.
There's plenty of great nest designs like these available to purchase online, although,
they can often be quite pricey.
So if you're on a budget and/or the crafty type, you can create your own.
I've mostly housed my ants in what’s called, autoclaved aerated concrete, which is basically,
a very light aerated brick, commonly known as AAC or ytong.
The material is great, it absorbs water quickly and retains it really well.
So you won’t have to worry about drowning your ants when hydrating and can afford to
water less often, than say, plaster, grout or acrylic based nests.
This is a ytong nest I bought from Tar Heel Ants, which has successfully housed a number
of different colonies of mine throughout the years.
If you're not so worried about observing every little thing the colony get up to, you can
opt for a more naturalistic setup.
Simply fill a jar, container or a fish tank with some form of substrate, like sand or
soil, and then introduce the ants.
It can be quite fascinating watching them dig out tunnels to construct their nest, as
they would in the wild.
You can even grow plants in there too, as I've done here with this setup.
Just remember to sterilize the substrate by either baking or boiling it first.
This will kill any harmful bacteria, fungi, mites, ect.
Some species of ants may prefer or require a more specialized nesting environment.
Wood ants for example, often nest within logs naturally, so a wooden or perhaps a cork nest
would be ideal for them.
A more extreme example would be weaver ants, they live up in trees, constructing their
nests by sticking leaves together using silk produced from the colonies larvae.
To keep them, you’d want to set up a terrarium containing a plant with appropriate leaves
for nest construction.
Mikey Bustos, over at Ants Canada, has done some videos covering the rearing of a weaver
ant colony, which I highly recommend watching.
So, as well as better understanding the colonies diet, identifying the species of ant you have
will reveal what sort of nesting environment they will require.
To begin with, you want to make sure the nest you introduce is not overly large.
Start small and increase the size of the nest or add additional ones as the colony grows.
If the ants have too much space, they may feel vulnerable and uncomfortable.
Ants prefer inhabiting tight spaces in which they feel safe and secure.
Too much space can also result in the ants piling up their dead and scraps of food within
their nest, as opposed to their outworld area.
Which can quickly start to mold and take over the nest if exposed to moisture.
So after you've chosen an appropriate nest, attach it up to your outworld, via the way
of some tubing or place your current setup inside the tank if you're going for the naturalist
approach.
Keep the new nest area dark and moist, while exposing the test tubes to light and the ants
should start to relocate into their new nest.
Different species will prefer different levels of moisture and humidity, so establishing
a moisture gradient within the nest is ideal.
Hydrate one edge of the nest area making it so half the nest is moist and half, dry.
This way the ants can move themselves and their brood into their ideal conditions.
A moist environment, like the nest, runs the risk of growing mold.
To reduce the risk, I like to vary the side in which I hydrate.
So, I'll water say, the right side of the nest, and then after a few days when that
area looks to be almost dry, I'll water the left side and continue this trend.
Mold won't grow without moisture, so this method just helps prevent places being continually
moist and more susceptible to growth.
It’s also a good idea to elevate your nests and allow for some air flow.
I usually position my colonies next to a window so the nest has some regular circulation of
fresh air.
Keep the colony in the dark, positioning it somewhere the temperature doesn't fluctuate
too much and ideally where it will remain between 20-30 Celsius.
Maintaining a temperature gradient within the nest can greatly assist in the colonies
development.
Simply place the edge of the nest on top of a heating mat in order to create the gradient
and carefully observe how the ants respond to it.
I covered how to safely heat a queen in previous tutorial and that same method should be applied
here.
Just remember, the heat will result in the nest drying out more quickly, so you'll need
to hydrate it more often.
The colony can last weeks and even months without food, but only a very minimal amount
of time without water.
So, it is essential that your ants have a constant access to water.
If you live within a temperate region, you should consider hibernating your ants.
In times of cold weather, ants will slow and even stop activity all together, going into
a state of diapause.
To allow them undergo this natural cycle, simply move them someplace cool during the
winter months.
An unheated, insulated room is a good spot.
Just make sure the temperature doesn’t drop too low.
Temperatures below freezing may be detrimental to the health of the ants.
Try to keep them slightly below room temperature, between 10 to 15 degrees Celsius.
You won’t need to feed the colony nearly as often during this period but always remember
to keep the nest hydrated.
When the weather warms up again, you'll see the ants slowly return to their active selves
again.
Watch as this Camponotus worker carries her seemingly dead sister into the sunlight.
As she warms up, she slowly begins moving again and comes back to life.
Ants are very productive insects, they keep their nests clean and maintained by constantly
shifting and cycling around the soil in which they live.
When keeping ants within a captive environment, the ants are obviously more restricted in
term of their nesting arrangement.
So it's important to assist them in keeping their home clean.
Every several months or so, what I’ll do is move the colony out of their existing home
and into a fresh one.
In order to influence a move like this, simply attach up the new nest and keep it moist and
in the dark, while exposing the old nest to light and keeping it as dry as possible.
It can often take some time before the colony completely relocates from one nest to another,
but there’s no need for any rush.
As I often say, ant keeping requires a good deal of patients.
When all the ants have finally been cleared out, then you can clean out the old nest.
I like to soak the whole thing in vinegar for a little while and afterwards, thoroughly
rinse it off with fresh water.
Then just let it dry out, and it's ready to house more ants again.
So that's about all I wanted to go over in this video.
Hopefully you enjoyed and it’s helped you out in some way.
I've now covered all the basics in ant keeping, from catching a queen, raising it up to workers
and finally, caring for the colony.
I’ve got a few ideas for my upcoming videos, but I’d love to hear your thoughts.
So leave a comment below and let me know what sort of future videos you'd like to see from
me.
Thanks so much for support everyone, almost 2,000 people have subscribed to the channel
now, which is crazy.
Great to see there's so many of you interested in ants.
Thanks again.