2012
Ultimate Ant Keeping
Handbook
by Mikey Bustos
AntsCanada.com
© 2012 AntsCanada. All rights reserved.
The AntsCanada logo is a trademark of AntsCanada, Inc.
10/14/2012
The Ultimate Ant Keeping Handbook
Table of Contents
Chapter 1: An Introduction to Ants .................................................................................... 4
The Prehistory and Evolution of Ants ............................................................................. 4
Myrmecology and Classification ..................................................................................... 5
Ant Biology ...................................................................................................................... 6
Stages of Life ................................................................................................................... 7
Caste System ................................................................................................................... 8
Reproduction ................................................................................................................... 9
Chapter 2: The History of Ant Keeping ............................................................................. 10
Uncle Milton Industries, Inc.. ........................................................................................ 10
Europe ........................................................................................................................... 10
AntsCanada ................................................................................................................... 11
Chapter 3: Pre-pet Research ............................................................................................. 13
Is a pet ant colony right for you? .................................................................................. 13
Online Resources ........................................................................................................... 14
Chapter 4: Setup ............................................................................................................... 15
Ant Keeping Gear .......................................................................................................... 15
The Formicarium........................................................................................................ 15
Upright Dirt Nests ...................................................................................................... 15
Gelfarms (Warning!!!) ............................................................................................... 16
Plaster Nests .............................................................................................................. 16
Cork Nests .................................................................................................................. 16
~1~
AAC Nests .................................................................................................................. 16
Habitat Nests™ .......................................................................................................... 17
The Basin ....................................................................................................................... 17
Basic Glass or Plastic Aquarium Basin ....................................................................... 18
Habitat Outworlds™ .................................................................................................. 18
Additional Supplies ........................................................................................................ 19
Chapter 5: It Starts with a Queen ..................................................................................... 20
Nuptial Flights ............................................................................................................... 20
Monogyny vs. Polygyny, Pleometrosis vs. Oligogyny ................................................... 21
Social Parasites .............................................................................................................. 22
Researching the Species in Your Area ........................................................................... 23
Queen Ant Hunting Tips ................................................................................................ 24
Chapter 6: The Colony Founding Process ......................................................................... 28
The Test Tube Setup ...................................................................................................... 28
The Two Methods of Colony Founding ......................................................................... 28
Fully Claustral Ant Species ......................................................................................... 29
Semi-claustral Ant Species......................................................................................... 30
Warmth ......................................................................................................................... 30
Unmated Queens .......................................................................................................... 31
Signs Your Queen Has Mated ........................................................................................ 31
Egg-laying and Colony Founding Timeline .................................................................... 32
Brood Boosting .............................................................................................................. 32
Feeding The Growing Colony ........................................................................................ 33
Changing dried out or moldy test tubes ....................................................................... 34
~2~
When to Move Queen and Colony into a Formicarium ................................................ 34
Techniques to Encourage the Move ............................................................................. 35
Polymorphism and Alates ............................................................................................. 35
Chapter 7: Feeding Your Ant Colony & Ant Nutrition ....................................................... 38
Protein ........................................................................................................................... 39
Carbohydrate................................................................................................................. 40
Water............................................................................................................................. 41
Chapter 8: The Right Ant Environment ............................................................................. 42
Moisture and Humidity ................................................................................................. 42
Heating .......................................................................................................................... 42
Chapter 9: Annual Hibernation ......................................................................................... 44
Why Hibernate Ant Colonies ......................................................................................... 44
When to Start and End Hibernation .............................................................................. 45
How to Hibernate .......................................................................................................... 45
Chapter 10: Nest Cycling and Hygiene .............................................................................. 48
Cycling Nests Every Few Years ...................................................................................... 48
Keeping Your Ants Free of Parasites ............................................................................. 49
Chapter 11: Conservation, Preservation, and Education ................................................. 50
How People Can Save Ants............................................................................................ 50
Myrmecology and Websites.......................................................................................... 51
Chapter 12: Caresheets (Listed by Species) ...................................................................... 52
Glossary ............................................................................................................................. 65
~3~
Chapter 1: An Introduction to Ants
The Prehistory and Evolution of Ants
Ants have been roaming the Earth since the days of the dinosaurs, with ant fossils
having been found from as far back as 92 million years ago during the Cretaceous period.
They’re thought to have evolved from wasp-like ancestors between 110 and 130 million years
ago, and gradually evolved into the ants we know today when flowering plants began to
dominate the world. Some might argue that ants are Earth’s true rulers, seeing as today they
inhabit all parts of the Earth except Antarctica, Greenland, and Iceland; form 15-20% of the
terrestrial animal biomass in ecosystems globally; and have been recorded at over 15,000 ant
species with thousands still left to be named and catalogued, and many more still being
discovered all the time.
In fact, before humans ever came into Earth’s picture, ants were actively farming
vegetation (leaf-cutter ants), tending and milking “ant cows” (aphid-tending ants), making
slaves out of others ants (slave-making ants), engaging in war using chemical warfare (formic
acid shot from the rear end of many ants), having raids (army ants), building massive cities, and
erecting great architectural structures. They’ve established their own garbage disposal systems,
and day care. There are ants that even have suicide bombers (a species of carpenter ant that
literally explodes at will into an acidic mess when in contact with an enemy) and child labour
(weaver ants that use their young’s silk to glue leaves together for their nests). For millions of
years ants have been creating highways, highway tolls (ant soldiers of some species allowing
ants of another species to pass only by surrendering food), setting up restroom facilities, day
care for the children, food distribution, and cemeteries. Ants have even had to contend with
various forms of zombie-ism!
Ants have democracy and members of the colony cast votes on their colonies’ various
issues, like where to start creating new nesting quarters and where to place the young, for
instance. Ants communicate through deposits of pheromones, biological chemicals that hold
messages for other ants that may pass by and smell them. These messages are like “ant twitter
posts,” and members of the colony even have the option of “retweeting” these posts by
~4~
releasing the same pheromone message. Every day there are trending topics (e.g.
“#FoodThisWay”, “#EnemySpotted”, “#RainingNowMoveTheKids”,
#QueenIsReadyToLayAnEggHelpHer).
Worker ants are working constantly, around the clock taking hundreds of temporary
two minute naps throughout a twenty-four hour cycle. In most ant species, an ant colony which
can reach millions of individuals depending on the species, originates from a single stay-athome mother. Ants from temperate regions hibernate in the winter, in sub-zero temperatures
which would normally be fatal for insects (and humans), but the ants produce an anti-freeze in
their blood during these periods, resulting in complete recovery year after year in the spring.
In the book The Leafcutter Ants: Civilisation by Instinct written by entomological icons B.
Holldobler and E.O. Wilson, it mentions that had extra-terrestrials visited Earth a million years
ago before humans existed, these aliens would have concluded that leafcutter ants were the
most advanced societies this planet would ever be able to produce. The book mentions that
these ants are the greatest superorganisms on Earth discovered to the present time.
Having co-evolved with other plants and animals through their millions of years of
existence, the complexities, sheer diversity, and varying behaviours of ants can truly boggle the
minds of those who are given the unique opportunity to watch and learn about their ways. This
is why ant keeping is such a rewarding and fun hobby. Ants truly are a highly advanced
civilization of their own, discreetly (and sometimes not so discreetly) working right under our
noses and ruling the world.
Myrmecology and Classification
Myrmecology is the scientific study of ants. Most myrmecologists refer to themselves as
biologists or entomologists (studiers of insects) because ants are so behaviourally and
ecologically tied to other plants and animals that those studying ants necessarily must study the
plants and animals the ants live with. (Note: Before continuing on, you might notice at the back
of this book there is a glossary of terms. If ever you come across a word which is unknown to
you, please feel free to visit the Glossary for the reference.)
~5~
Ants belong to a family of insects called Formicidae found within a greater order of
insects known as Hymenoptera (which also include bees and wasps). The family of ants
Formicidae is further broken up into subfamilies including Cerapachyinae, Dolichodeinae,
Ecitoninae, Formiciinae, Formicinae, Myrmicinae, Ponerinae, Poneromorphs, and
Pseudomyrmecinae. To date there are over 15,000 species of ants with actual identifying names
but thousands more ant species awaiting identification and classification. Every year many new
ant species and even entire ant genera (groupings of various related species) are being
discovered around the world.
Ant Biology
Ants like all insects, are composed of three major body segments and six legs, but what
separates ants from most other insects anatomically is the existence of a waist segment known
as the petiole. This waist segment creates such a unique morphological shape in ants (as well as
bees and wasps), that the three body parts of an ant are not called head, thorax and abdomen
like in other insects, but rather head, mesosoma, and gaster (or metasoma).
Ants, like all insects, are cold-blooded (the term used in biology is poikilothermic), which
in short means they are unable to produce their own body heat like humans, other mammals,
and birds do. They are the same temperature as their environment. In every animal all the
thousands of necessary chemical reactions required for every facet of life (e.g. food digestion,
brain activity muscle movement, cellular respiration, cell division, etc.) that happen in the body,
require heat, and the more heat that is applied to these chemical reactions, the quicker these
chemical reactions occur. It’s evident when trying to make tea in hot water, as opposed to cold
water. Heat simply speeds up reactions!
Evolutionally, being poikilothermic is advantageous to ants and other poikilothermic
animals because if it ever gets very cold, and food becomes scarce, the ants’ bodily functions
slow down to correspond with that decrease in resources. That is to say, in colder
temperatures, ants move slower, eat less, and react slower to stimuli. Other warm-blooded
animals must continue to eat food in cold weather in order to maintain that constant body
temperature needed to maintain a constant rate of chemical reactions happening in their body.
~6~
Ants, like most insects, don’t really have a brain, in the same sense that humans have a
brain. Their “brain” activity can be attributed to brain-like groupings of nervous tissue called
ganglia, which run down the centre of their body. It is why many insects still move even if you
chop off their head!
Ants possess two stomachs: a social stomach which is reserved for eaten food to be
shared with other members of the colony, and a personal stomach which is for their food
digestion. When an ant eats, the food gets stored in their social stomach where it is processed
usually into a soupy-like brew. When the ant comes in contact with another ant that might be
hungry, a sort of “kissing position” is assumed and the full ant transfers a portion of the soupylike brew from its social stomach into the mouth of the hungry ant. To communicate that a
hungry ant would like some food, it will move in to “kiss” the other ant and rub its cheeks and
mouthparts to stimulate regurgitation and perhaps to taste the goods as they are being
regurgitated out. This method of transferring food from mouth to mouth is known as
trophallaxis, and is also performed by bees and wasps.
Trophallaxis as mode of food transfer is great for ants because living in underground,
moist environments, it is important that food material isn’t left lying around for very long as
they can breed harmful bacteria, fungi, and microbes. It also means that not all the members of
the colony need to leave the nest in order find food, as they will be having ‘delivery’ courtesy of
their siblings!
Other than mandibles which can be used to seize and slice at enemies, depending on
the species ants have the ability to either sting (by way of a physical retractable stinger as in
bees and wasps) or spray Formic acid.
Stages of Life
Like many insects, ants undergo complete metamorphosis where they begin life as an
egg, which hatches into a worm-like larva, which grows and molts along the way, and
eventually becomes a pupa. Ants belonging to the subfamily Myrmicinae have naked pupae,
which appear as white seemingly mummified ants, while other ants belonging to the other
~7~
major subfamily Formicinae have pupae encased in beige cocoons. These cocoons which are
formed with the larva’s silk (and often requires the help of adult ants who bury the larvae with
debris to give the larva a framework in which to spin their cocoon) and have a black dot on one
end called the meconium which is the larva’s fecal pellet. During the larval stage, there is no
fecal excretion, which helps keep the nest clean seeing as ant larvae are generally unable to
crawl far distances to get to the colony bathroom area. Therefore, it is excreted once in the
larva’s life and excreted inside the cocoon. After some development in the pupa, they emerge
as full grown ants.
Caste System
Ants are social insects that have a caste system of different specialized forms that take
on various unique functions within ant society. All ants are born into their respective caste and
remain in that form for their entire life. There are
worker ants, which most people see wandering
around above ground. They handle the bulk of
the colony’s duties, including cleaning, food
collection, tunnel digging, caring for the young,
defense, and more. They are all female and are
M ALE A NT ( SPECIES: T ETRAMORIUM SP E)
barren. There are also female alates, which are
young virgin queens born in the nest and have
wings. These become the new founding queens of their own colonies after they mate during a
nuptial flight. There are also male ants, which tend to look more like wasps but are typically
smaller than the queen alates. Their only job is to mate with the female alates during nuptial
flight, after which they die. There are also other denominations of workers in some species, e.g.
majors which are specialized larger worker ants often used to defend the colony from attack or
tear apart food items, and minors which are smaller worker ants often used for caring for the
young. Some highly specialized species of ants even have additional worker denominations like
submajors (smaller majors).
~8~
Reproduction
The ant life cycle is a different from most other insects because of the existence of these
reproductive ants, the alates. These alates appear in the colony from special eggs laid by the
queen usually when the colony passes a certain size. These alates are larger than the worker
ants and are born with wings. They are the reproductive males and young queens. During what
is called a nuptial flight, which takes place at a specific time of the year, all these alates take to
the air and mate with each other, after which the male alates die and the female alates drop to
the ground, break off their wings (upon which they are called dealates), and venture off on
their own in search of a suitable place usually underground (depending on the species) to start
their new colony alone. These now wingless queens become the official egg-laying queens of
their own respective colonies, and the workers care for their queen for the rest of their life.
Eventually, when a new colony gets big enough, the queen will begin to lay eggs which will turn
into alates, and the process starts all over again.
It’s amazing to imagine that only one day of mating is enough for a queen ant to
continue laying eggs for the rest of her life, which can mean up to around thirty long years! The
secret is a special organ in her body called a spermatheca which keeps the sperm from her
matings during nuptial flight viable for all the years of her life.
~9~
Chapter 2: The History of Ant Keeping
Uncle Milton Industries, Inc..
The earliest known record of the ant keeping hobby can be traced back to 1956. A man
named Milton Levine began creating homes for ants and selling these pet ant kits at a circus
fair. According to Levine, from the moment they opened these plastic homes for ants were
selling like crazy, and their popularity grew so quickly. The ant home consisted of gravel
sandwiched between two clear panes of Plexiglas, as well as the depiction of a farm in the
background. The ants would dig through the gravel and made for excellent viewing into the
lives of how ants lived and worked. These ant keeping kits were called Antfarms, a brand name
which to this day is still owned by Uncle Milton Industries, Inc.. Based in Westlake Village,
California.
Since opening, Uncle Milton Industries, Inc. has shipped over 20 million antfarms
worldwide and their well-known kits have enriched the lives of many generations. Eventually,
the company began mailing live worker ants to customers that would send in a coupon
obtained from the antfarm package. The educational toy became such a hit, and soon Uncle
Milton Industries began selling a whole line of educational toys like “Sea Monkey” kits which
allowed one to rear brine shrimp in water.
Milton Levine, who many consider the father of hobbyist ant keeping, passed away in
January 16th, 2011 from natural causes at the age of 98. Uncle Milton Industries, Inc. has since
been sold to a toy-making company.
Europe
Around the 1980’s and 90’s a more serious, less novelty-type approach to pet ant
keeping emerged in Europe, perhaps shortly after herpetoculture (the captive rearing of exotic
reptiles and amphibians) and tarantula keeping began to first make its appearance in the pet
trade. There began ant keeping supply stores in various European countries which offered pro
ant keeping equipment, also based on Uncle Milton’s initial antfarm designs. They began to
even sell entire colonies with a queen, which was a new thing seeing as Uncle Milton only
offered worker ants in the mail and no queen due to shipping laws.
~ 10 ~
Soon even the upright gravel sandwich design of the original antfarm was revolutionized
and new materials began to arise for keeping pet ants including plaster-of-Paris, cork, and a
special water absorbent brick known as automated aerated concrete. In the late 1990’s to
2000’s pet ant keeping had become so advanced that it had become a sort of underground
craze in Europe among enthusiasts, and the body of knowledge about the captive care of ants
evolved, improved, and grew.
AntsCanada
In 2010, a Canadian man named Mikey Bustos (author of this book), who loved ants and
owned an Uncle Milton antfarm as a child, was inspired by the YouTube videos of ant keepers in
Europe which portrayed entire ant colonies with a queen housed in more naturalistic captive
ant setups. It inspired Mikey so much that he went on to create original designs of ant homes
using ordinary home materials. He began to keep ant colonies in these ant homes and started
to film the lives of his ants, creating reality-type ant videos for YouTube. His YouTube name was
AntsCanada and his channel is called “The Amazing Ants of AntsCanada”.
As his ant videos grew in popularity on YouTube, he began to create videos of
ant collecting in the field as well as instructional videos on pet ant care, giving rise to a series of
detailed ant video tutorials. When the AntsCanada YouTube channel grew to the most
subscribed-to ant-related YouTube channel on the net, Mikey decided to create a website
which initially aimed to help promote awareness on serious ant keeping (as opposed to the
novelty-type ant keeping of the original Uncle Milton antfarms).
Later, the site began to offer for online purchase an array of special designs of
ant homes as seen in Mikey’s YouTube videos. From the moment AntsCanada opened, it sold
thousands of ant keeping kits around the world. It also offered a book on collecting queen ants
and entire ant colonies, hosted an online live streaming monthly show on Ustream, held ant
demonstrations at elementary schools and contests for subscribers, and even published
humorous educational ant songs. AntsCanada soon became the most well-known pet ant
keeping name and website on the internet.
~ 11 ~
Today AntsCanada is an organization promoting the pet ant keeping hobby,
myrmecology, ecology, and habitat conservation. Its aim is to make pet ant keeping simple and
enjoyable and thereby promote ant awareness and inspire conservation. AntsCanada has
contributed to scientific research, and consulted with agricultural companies and museums. It is
the world’s leading international online ants store with unique ant keeping gear. AntsCanada
and its products have been featured on the Discovery Channel and Animal Planet. It also hosts
the largest online ant community on YouTube and Facebook. Its main office is located in
Toronto, Canada with its main manufacturing facility in Manila, Philippines.
~ 12 ~
Chapter 3: Pre-pet Research
Is a pet ant colony right for you?
The great advantages of ant keeping are that ants are small and require less space than
a dog, cat, or rabbit; ants do not make noise; if their enclosures are cleaned properly they are
odourless; they don’t require visits to a vet; other than their home, there are few expenses
associated with their care; they do not require constant grooming; a queen ant caught from
outside is free; ants don’t require constant handling, socialization or interaction with their
owners; they can be left to care for themselves for a few days if need be; and unless someone is
allergic to their bite, ants aren’t dangerous; and they are very educational pets for kids, teens,
and adults alike, and are a great way to learn about nature, biological relationships,
organization, and responsibility.
Before owning any pet, it is important to ask oneself if their lifestyle is suitable for pet
ant keeping. Even though they are just tiny ants, an entire ant colony composed of possibly
millions of individual lives will depend on you for food, water, environmental conditions.
garbage disposal, and so on, and the responsibilities do take time and effort.
Here are some questions to consider before getting into serious pet ant keeping:





A full grown ant colony can require a minimum of about 1 m X 1 m of space. Do you
have enough space to accommodate a setup of this size?
A queen ant can survive for as long as 30 years of age. Are you willing to commit to
caring for an ant colony for that long, or do you know anyone who might want to
take them home in case you need to rehome them? Releasing a captive-raised ant
colony into the wild can be dangerous to the ants (e.g. if released within the
Most ant species require an insect food source. The demands of food of a very old,
mature ant colony can be pretty overwhelming for someone who is not used to
buying live crickets or mealworms from a pet store on a regular basis. This requires
funds and time. Are you willing to spend $10 a week on crickets or mealworms? Are
you willing to make the travel to and from the pet store to pick them up? Are you
ok with handling the live insects?
Ants require a sweet food source like honey and fruits. Are you able to spend the
funds and time providing your ant colony with a sugary food source?
A large mature ant colony can produce a lot of garbage and piles of dead ants. Are
you willing to take the time to clean up their refuse and dead bodies on a weekly
basis?
~ 13 ~
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Does your place of residence allow pets? Are there other members of the family
that might despise ants? Do you have other pets like a cat or dog that can mess
with your ant setup? Are there small children around that might get into your ant
setup and possibly hurt themselves or your ants?
If you have to leave your home for whatever reason, is there someone who can
care for your ants’ maintenance?
Ants require room temperature in the least and do not do well in a cold air
conditioned room. Is there a place in your home in which you can place the ant
setup? If in an air conditioned room, are you willing to spend $25 on heating
equipment to keep the nest heated?
Are you willing to take a few minutes every week to keep watering tubes clean and
full of fresh water on a weekly basis?
Review these questions before making the decision to own a pet ant colony.
Online Resources
It is highly recommended that any new or wannabe ant keeper, make use of the large
online ant keeping community. The body of knowledge on captive ant husbandry is constantly
evolving and growing, with new information on ant care always emerging.
www.AntsCanada.com offers an extremely helpful forum and live chat feature for ant
keepers to exchange information and discuss about their ant colonies. There are even regularly
updated journal entries of ant keepers from around the world posting about their growing ant
colonies. The website also offers a very helpful section on Starting Your Own Ant Colony and
Ant Care.
It is also highly recommended that you subscribe to the AntsCanada YouTube Channel at
www.Youtube.com/AntsCanada
for many helpful ant tutorials, insights on ants, interviews with
myrmecologists, and scenes of ant colony life within a nest. You can also join the largest
Facebook ant group http://www.facebook.com/groups/128300623950/ and follow AntsCanada on
Twitter www.Twitter.com/AntsCanada to acquire useful ant keeping tips.
~ 14 ~
Chapter 4: Setup
Ant Keeping Gear
When you’ve decided that ant keeping is indeed something you are ready to explore
and commit to, the next step is to ensure you have all the necessary equipment.
The Formicarium
Formicarium is the technical term used by ant keepers to refer to the unit used to house
an ant colony. For the purposes of this book, formicarium will be used to describe the simulated
nest area of the colony. It is in this nesting area where the queen and young reside, as well as
where the workers live, rest, and perform construction duties.
The following are qualities of a good formicarium:
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

It must provide enough space for the colony to create areas for storing the young,
food items, and for congregating, but not too spacious that the ants feel too
exposed and unprotected.
It must also retain moisture well, particularly for those ant species which prefer a
humid and moist nest (see Chapter 12: Care Sheets Listed by Species).
It must allow for ample ventilation, and for the purposes of the ant keeper good
visibility of the ant colony.
It must be chemical-free (e.g. paint or lacquers)
It must be mold resistant
If must provide the ants the chance to dig
Ant keepers have several options when selecting a formicarium for their colony.
Upright Dirt Nests
Most are familiar with the upright dirt formicaria (based on the original Uncle Milton
antfarm design) involving sand or gravel sandwiched between two panes of glass or acrylic. The
advantages of these formicaria are that they offer the ants a chance to dig their own tunnels
and generally retain water well. They are however problematic when the ants start to dig away
from the glass and start piling sand against the glass to block the light. Many ant keepers
housing their colonies in dirt nests feel helpless when they purposely hide their queen and
young from view. Due to the design and lack of drainage, upright dirt farms offer an additional
risk of drowning your ant colony if too much water is added.
~ 15 ~
Gelfarms (Warning!!!)
There has been a recent product released geared towards keeping ants, known as
‘Antworks’. It allows the ants to dig in a coloured, transparent gel which apparently also
contains nutrients to nourish the ants. This gelfarm product was designed to house worker ants
mailed to the ant keeper. It premise is “set-it-and-forget-it” where you place the ants inside and
there is no other maintenance required. While these gelfarms may be satisfactory for housing
worker ants, there are many reasons why these nests are unsuitable for ant colonies. They are
very mold-prone and even though the gel does contain a fungicide, mold will grow when the
ants begin to establish a restroom area, which they necessarily do. Also, the gel only offers
electrolytes which are enough to sustain workers for the few weeks that they naturally live, but
do not contain the necessary proteins and other nutrients needed to nourish the queen and
growing young. Serious ant keepers know that the gelfarms are unsuitable homes for pet ant
colonies. Never attempt to house your ants in a gelfarm!
Plaster Nests
Many have used formicaria crafted from plaster-of-Paris, an option commonly used in
laboratories studying ants. Plaster nest formicaria make fair homes for ants, but the plaster
does eventually mold, especially when dead ants or food are left lying around, upon which the
ant colony must be moved to a new formicarium so they aren’t killed by the mold outbreak.
These formicaria also do not allow the ants to dig.
Cork Nests
Widely used in Europe are formicaria made from cork. Cork nests absorb water well and
are slightly more mold resistant than plaster, but they do eventually mold as well, and must be
changed routinely. Cork nests do not allow ants to dig.
AAC Nests
Another material used widely in Europe is called AAC or autoclaved aerated concrete
(and other names like Hebel Brick) which is a type of brick used in construction with millions of
microscopic bubbles allowing for the brick to be highly water absorbent. Nests made from AAC
~ 16 ~
work well for ant colonies because they are mold-resistant, but they do not offer the ants the
opportunity to dig as they would in the wild.
Habitat Nests™
AntsCanada.com offers premium formicaria known as Habitat Nests ™ specially
designed to successfully rear large, healthy ant colonies while making maintenance manageable
and colony visibility optimal. They are high in naturalism, having been used to film ant colonies
for nature documentaries of the Discovery Channel, highly water absorbent, and even offer the
ants the ability to dig and customize their living space as they would in nature without being
able to dig away from view. The design of the Habitat Nests ™ even enables the ants to create
ant hills as they would in the wild. They are mold resistant, offer amazing visibility, allow for
great ventilation and are the #1 top choice of formicarium for pro ant keepers around the
world.
The Basin
Also commonly known in ant keeping as an outworld, the basin is a wide, spacious area
which simply provides your ants a space to forage, as they would in the wild. It is typically
connected to your formicarium via a tube. Worker ants will venture out of the formicarium and
into the basin in search of food. It is your job as an ant keeper to make sure to provide the ants
with food and water in their basin. You are your ants’ regular food and water provider.
The basin is also the location where ants will dump their garbage and dead bodies in
neat piles for you to clean. It is your job to make sure such garbage and dead bodies aren’t left
lying around for long periods of time as they can breed bacteria, fungi, and microbes harmful to
your ants. Therefore, it is also your role to play your ants’ routine garbage men and undertaker.
The following are qualities of a good basin:

It should create an ideal foraging space for your ants but shouldn’t offer an
attractive nesting space. The reason for this is you will want to keep your ants from
wanting to move their colony out of your formicarium and into your basin. It occurs
often in ant keeping that an ant colony that is living in a formicarium will find a
suitable, tight, and dark crevice under a rock decoration, for instance, and one
morning you’re left with an empty formicarium and an entire colony hiding in the
~ 17 ~
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basin. For this reason, live plants with soil are often impossible to keep in a basin
without the ants being able to move their colonies in.
It should be spacious and allow for a good amount of surface to forage
It should be easy to clean
It should be escape-proof
It should allow for good ventilation
It should be easy to humidify
Basic Glass or Plastic Aquarium Basin
Some ant keepers prefer to have their ants forage in a glass or plastic aquarium that is
very basically decorated, perhaps with a shallow pebble ground layer and some sticks. A hole is
drilled into the glass (using a special drill bit designed for drilling holes in glass) through which a
tube is connect and attached to the formicarium. These basins are often left open without a
cover and a deterrent like petroleum jelly or baby powder mixed with alcohol is smothered in a
thick 2 inch band along the top of the aquarium to keep the ants from escaping. These basins
are effective but are often fall short in visual presentation, due to the inability to use rocks, soil
or substrate, or any decoration that might offer an attractive nesting location.
Habitat Outworlds™
AntsCanada.com also offers a beautiful array of highly naturalistic basins called Habitat
Outworlds™. There are several designs (e.g. Forest, Desert, Rainforest) for you to choose from
for your ant colonies. Due to their high naturalism they have also been used to film ants for
nature documentaries of the Discovery Channel. The ground portion is solid and the ants
cannot dig into it. All plants and sticks are artificial and do not create suitable places for ants to
make into a nesting location. They are easy to clean, easily hydrated and ventilated, attach
easily to any formicarium via a tube, and add a touch of natural beauty to your ants’ setup.
~ 18 ~
Additional Supplies
Other supplies you may need include:
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magnifying glass
tweezers
glass test tubes
clear connecting tubes
cotton
a deterrent to keep the ants from escaping open areas of their living space:
petroleum jelly or baby powder + rubbing alcohol
Q-tips
thin and long BBQ Skewers (so useful for various random functions)
heating cable (if you’re place is air-conditioned)
small plastic containers for queen collecting
hand spray/atomizer
honey
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Chapter 5: It Starts with a Queen
So now you have all you need to house your colony. Now all you need is the seed of
your ant colony, the queen ant. This can be the tricky part but with some patience, necessary
knowledge, and eyes peeled, you will eventually find a queen ant.
Nuptial Flights
As previously mentioned, ants typically have two periods of a few weeks within the year
when mating occurs. These periods of breeding are called Nuptial Flights. All the ants you
commonly see walking around above ground (the so called 'ordinary worker ants') are all
barren females and do not mate during these Nuptial Flights or ever in their lives. The only ants
involved in this mating are young queen ants and male ants; they are known as alates, and are
born in the nest and wait around all year until it's time for nuptial flight mating. The alates are
special in that they are born with wings. Yes, wings! Ever seen those ants that look like ants
with wings? They were ants after all and not some kind of stiff hornet!
Every species of ant has its nuptial flights around specific times in the year, most of
which in temperature regions fall within Spring and early Fall, though the nuptial flights of many
species carry out into the summer. In tropical regions mating can happen year round or during
specific months of the year. During the nuptial flight the young winged queens and males fly
into the air, they mate while flying (the queen will often mate with several males), and then
finally drop to the ground a few hours later. The males then die after mating, as breeding with
the young queens during nuptial flight is their only purpose in the ant world. Mated females
break off their wings and begin searching for a new location to begin their own colonies. Some
species of ants will accept these now pregnant queens back to the nest (these types of ants are
discussed in the next section), but generally most don't, and the queens are off on their own in
search of a suitable place to begin a nest, where each queen will eventually give birth to their
first set of babies.
Your job is to try to find these queens that are either flying and mating during a nuptial
flight or are in the midst of searching for a new nest location after their nuptial flight. These are
~ 20 ~
the only opportunities for you to capture these newly gravid queens, because for the rest of
their life afterwards they are underground.
Chapter 12 of this book offers a list of the most commonly kept ant species and includes
when their nuptial flights occur, as well as photos of queens. Be sure to study the ant species of
your area.
Monogyny vs. Polygyny, Pleometrosis vs. Oligogyny
In the ant world, there are some species of ants that are known to have multiple queens
laying eggs in the nest. It is an effective survival trait in these species, as it increases the
chances of colony success. The quicker a colony can grow large, the better chance that colony
has to survive. Polygyny is the harmonious co-habitation of more than one queen in a single
nest. Species like Myrmica rubra, Solenopsis invicta, and several species belonging to Formica
and Camponotus are known to be polygynous. Conversely, monogyny describes the existence
of only one queen per colony.
As a rule, particularly if you are a beginner, you should refrain from housing multiple
queens together, even if you are under the impression that they are a polygynous species. It is
often difficult even for the experienced ant keeper to accurately identify an ant species and the
mixing the queens of two different but similar-looking species or a monogynous species could
be fatal for the queens involved.
Plus, many ant species undergo what is called pleometrosis where two or more queens
will cooperatively raise their young together during the beginning stages of colony founding, as
if they are polygynous, but the moment the first worker ants arrive, the queens themselves will
fight to the death, and/or the workers will eliminate all but one of the queens; the most
dominant will remain standing. The reason pleometrosis can be attractive to an ant keeper is
because more young are produced within a shorter time frame. However, despite this ‘colony
founding short cut’ there is still a possibility the surviving queen will suffer sustained injuries
from the fight, or worse you may end up with all queens dying. So as a warning, if you mix
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freshly caught queens into a single container or test tube, and they seem to be getting along
well, it does not mean they are polygynous.
There are also polygynous ants whose queens raise their young together cooperatively
for the initial stages, and then the dominant queen will not kill the less dominant queen, but
will drive her to a further area in the nest. This is called oligogyny and if a species is oligogynous
the queens should be housed in a larger more multi-faceted setup to ensure the queens can
stay separated during the founding stage. Creating a setup like this means that the queens
should be housed in a proper formicarium right away, and not in a test tube setup (more about
the test tube setup later). Again, in oligogynous ants, there is still a chance of injury if the queen
confrontation gets extra rough.
Overall, if you choose to mix queens during the colony founding process do so at your
own risk! It is highly recommended, however, not to mix your queen ants at all during any stage
of the colony founding process regardless of whether or not you feel they are a polygynous
species. It’s better safe than sorry.
Social Parasites
These species of ants are worth mentioning in this book. There are some ants known as
social parasites, whose queen ants after mating specialize in breaking into a another ant
species’ nest (a specific host species, and not just any ant species), killing the queen, and
essentially taking over the host nest as primary egg-layer, until the entire colony is composed of
her biological young. The worker ants of the host colony believe she is their queen by way of
convincing pheromones, and they proceed to care for her and her young, as if she were their
birth mother. Renowned myrmecologist Dr. James Trager, who has dedicated many years of his
life to studying ant social parasites, suggests that it is highly likely the socially parasitic queens
break into the host colony nest, kill the host queen, and rub the dead corpse over themselves
to mask their scent with the host queen’s pheromones.
Socially parasitic queens are unable to begin their colonies on their own, and require
their host colony to proceed. Most social parasitic ants have a specific or preferred host. These
~ 22 ~
social parasitic queens will be useless to you (unless you provide them a host colony, which
very hard to do even for experienced ant keepers) if you capture one. The queens of social
parasites typically have larger heads and mandibles (jaws) for killing the host queens and
smaller gasters seeing as they don’t require any fasting period, typical of ordinary queens
during the founding stage while young are developing, since these social parasitic queens take
over an already mature host colony.
In Europe there have been successful techniques at introducing a social parasitic species
to host workers in captivity. Essentially, it involves taking the social parasitic queen ant
captured during nuptial flight, then allowing her to hibernate with host workers. Every attempt
performed by ant keepers at AntsCanada has failed. The reason introducing a social parasite to
a host parasite is difficult is because it is hard to match a social parasitic species to its specific
host. Identifying ant species with accuracy is difficult enough without close examination of body
parts under a microscope, which is beyond the scope of most experienced ant keepers as it is.
In addition, the world of social parasitism is largely unexplored so there isn’t really a resource in
existence yet with a list of social parasitic species with their host species match. It’s kind of a
gamble when you mix any two ant species together. Most often it ends tragically with one or
both parties dying from fighting.
If you’re unsure or you are a beginner ant keeper, it is best you do not mix your ants,
and attempt to find yourself another non-socially parasitic ant species.
Researching the Species in Your Area
We firmly believe that researching the ants in your area is the most important step to
ant collecting. When you are fully aware of what the ants in your area look like, what the
queens look like, where they usually nest, and when in the year their nuptial flights are,
catching them should be easy.
The worldwide web is a great source for research online. Familiarize yourself with what
a queen ant looks like in comparison to ordinary worker ants. If you think all ants look the
same, you're wrong, and need to study further. You can start by logging onto www.Google.com
~ 23 ~
and typing into the search box "Ant species in ___________" and include your city,
province/state, or country. Find out what species of ants are common where you live (they will
often be listed by scientific name so don't be frightened if you see strange names like
Solenopsis invicta or Tetramorium or Lasius neoniger or Formica fusca).
Chapter 12 of this book offers a list of the most commonly kept ant species and includes
when their nuptial flights occur along with photos of queens. It also mentions whether the ants
are polygynous, monogynous, pleometrotic, or are social parasites.
If you cannot find the species you are researching in Chapter 12 of this book, you can
also participate in the ant forum and chat feature at www.AntsCanada.com. You will likely be
able to connect with someone in your area and exchange useful information on nuptial flights
or even have someone with whom to go ant hunting or trade collections.
If all else fails, www.Antweb.org also offers a great database of information on specific
ant species, once you have a list of ants in your area. Simply log onto the site and search your
ant species. It should provide you with plenty of species-specific information on nest locations,
distribution, description, behaviour, as well as offer a great array of close up photographs of
specimens.
Queen Ant Hunting Tips
Catching your queen ant can initially seem like a bit of a challenge especially if you think
you have never seen a queen ant before. However, with persistence you will find a queen ant.
Here are some tips to remember:
1. KEEP YOUR EYES PEELED.
Your goal is to seek queens that have just mated and are wandering in search of a nest
site. The main secret to finding queens is to keep your eyes to the ground at all times no matter
where you go, regardless of what time in the day. This cannot be stressed enough! Hundreds
upon thousands of alates participate in these nuptial flights yearly so queens are undeniably
around, only most people don’t notice them.
~ 24 ~
2. KEEP ON THE LOOKOUT 24-7.
Newly mated queen ants seek nesting sites at all times of the day: morning, noon,
afternoon, evening, and even in the wee hours of the morning at 3 AM! As you’re out going
about your day, continually scan the ground for movement and insects. Check out every little
thing that you feel might be a queen ant. Be sure to not crash into anything as your eyes are to
the ground!
3. ALWAYS CARRY SEVERAL CONTAINERS WITH YOU AT ALL
TIMES.
Every day have a number of small bottles or containers stashed away in a pocket or bag,
no matter what! You just never know when you’ll find a queen ant. It may be while you’re in
the middle of a busy downtown street corner or while you’re walking outside of the grocery
store to your car. Always be prepared to stumble upon a queen ant.
4. KNOW WHAT SPECIES TO LOOK OUT FOR AND WHERE TO
LOOK.
Continually familiarize yourself with what the species that are currently flying look like
so you know what to look out for. Though your research may say that a particular ant species
prefers to nest in a habitat type that may not be your current location (e.g. you live in the city
and you found an ant species that prefers to nest at the edge of a forest), still scan your
surroundings regardless of where you may be. Many species have been able to adapt to the
cityscape, and those listed as forest dwellers, for instance, may have found a similar nesting
environment fulfilling all their requirements in your own backyard!
Check sidewalks and roadsides when you’re outside. Scan the ground everywhere you
walk. Take a stroll through a forest or park pathway and scan the ground for queens. When
you're indoors anywhere, check window sills. You may find queens at the huge windows trying
to get out of stores or shops after having accidentally flown in. Many people find queen ants
engaging in nuptial flights as they’re driving, getting caught in the windshield wipers. Park your
car and scoop them all up!
~ 25 ~
5. SPOT QUEENS BY THEIR MOVEMENT AND BODIES.
You will be able to spot the queens by way of their larger size and by the way they
move. If you’re good at picking out detail, you will notice that the queens move differently on
the ground than workers. They tend to move like they’re heavier, often travel in straighter lines
and seem to be less agile or "zig-zaggy" when traveling than worker ants. If you happen to see
an ant scuttling about a few feet away that seems a little larger than usual or seems to move
differently, check her out!
You can even capture queen ants while they’re mating during the actual nuptial flights.
Most see this as the ideal situation because if you capture a queen while a male is attached to
her gaster (the technical term for her abdomen), you know that she’s been fertilized for sure!
Try to be aware of all the insects around you. If something flies by, follow it with your
eyes to see if it's a queen (or a queen with a male or males mating with her), and try to see her
better when she lands. Once again, if you're good at picking up details, you might notice that
queen ants fly through the air more like lady beetles than they do flies, bees, or butterflies.
Flying queen ants are less agile and less “zig-zaggy” in flight.
One of the biggest giveaways as to whether an ant is a queen or not, besides her larger
gaster and overall body size is the two scars on their thorax where her wings used to be
attached. When you have studied and seen many photos of the queens in your area, you should
be familiar enough to be able to distinguish them from ordinary workers.
6. QUEENS WITH WINGS ARE STILL VALUABLE.
It’s important to note that some people feel that queens that have not broken off their
wings are unfertilized, which in our experience is untrue. Even if the queens have their wings
on, bottle them up, because they still may be fertilized. These queens may end up removing
their wings later, or may go into having her young with her wings still intact. Conversely, even if
a queen has broken off her wings it doesn’t necessarily mean she is fertilized. Your best bet is to
collect as many queens as possible and hope one of them gives you a successful colony. We
have found that the majority of queens caught usually are mated.
~ 26 ~
7. TRY NOT TO USE YOUR FINGERS.
Picking up the queens with your fingers may cause injury to the queen if you’re
inexperienced at holding them. If you are able, get the queen to walk onto a small piece of
paper and simply slide her into your container, or you can get her to walk onto a leaf or blade
of grass, and simply drop the entire leaf into the container. Picking a queen up with your bare
fingers may injure her, so do what you can to capture queens fingers-free.
8. DON’T PUT MULTIPLE QUEENS IN ONE CONTAINER.
Placing multiple queens in a single container often leads to death if the queens begin a
formic acid or stinging war.
9. BE SAFE AND DON’T TRESSPASS.
Safety and the law come first. While your eyes are kept to the ground, it is easy to crash
into poles, trees, random objects, fall into holes, or get in the way of an oncoming car, so be
sure to also look around you and be aware as much as possible of your surroundings as you’re
queen ant hunting. Also, do not wander onto private property, regardless of how much of an
‘Ant Mecca’ the property might seem like. Ask permission first.
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Chapter 6: The Colony Founding Process
The Test Tube Setup
Once you’ve captured your queen ant the next step is to give her exactly what she’s
been looking for all this time. You must give her a founding chamber, where she can proceed to
rest, lay her eggs, and start her colony. You must place her into what is called in ant keeping a
test tube setup. A test tube setup involves using cotton to form a water reservoir at the lower
portion of a test tube. To do this you simply hold a test tube upright with the opening pointing
up, fill the test tube up to about 60-70% full of clean water, then push a cotton ball down
quickly into the water until it traps the water on the lower end of the test tube. Remember to
push the cotton ball down quickly so there are no trapped air bubbles when the water portion
is formed. You can use a Q-tip or any thin
long instrument to push the cotton call
down into the test tube, but always make
sure to thoroughly wash your hands and
any instruments that come in contact with
the cotton or test tube, before making your
test tube, because you want to minimize
the chances of mold growing in your test
tube setup. Also, do not attempt to use
sugar-water, honey-water, or juice for the water portion of the test tube setup because it will
inevitably lead to uncontrollable mold-growth within the test tube setup.
If you do not have access to a glass test tube, you can also purchase water picks from
your local florist. They are plastic test tube-like containers for holding water secured at the
bottom of bouquets to keep flowers fresh. They often cost under $1. Make sure to purchase
several in case you need them.
The Two Methods of Colony Founding
Ants fall under one of two greater categories in relation to founding a colony. Your ant is
either a fully claustral species or a semi-claustral species. Which category the queen ant falls
~ 28 ~
into depends on the species. (You can refer to Chapter 12 which lists the most commonly kept
ant species and indicates whether they are fully claustral or semi-claustral.)
Fully Claustral Ant Species
The first category into which most commonly kept ant species fall, is the category
known as fully claustral ant species. This means that after mating, the queen will seek a suitable
location typically underground and seal herself off completely from the rest of the world where
she will rest begin the colony founding process by laying eggs. She remains in this sealed off
chamber known as a claustral cell and never comes out to eat or hunt. In fact, she fasts
completely during this entire period. She simply lays her eggs, nurses the larvae that hatch by
feeding them a nutritious soup that she regurgitates (this nourishing soup is manufactured
from the tissues making up her back muscles which used to power her wings), and after these
larvae pupate, the first round of workers (called nanitics) take over and begin to care for the
queen. These nanitics also are the first to emerge from the claustral cell, as they burrow
outwards and start constructing what is to become the colony’s nest. The nanitics emerge
above ground find food and bring it back to their queen, fellow workers, and larvae.
The colony founding process of the fully claustral queen described above means
that test tube rearing is easier for you as the ant keeper, if you catch a fully claustral ant
species. Fortunately, most ants caught do fall under this category. After placing fully-claustral
queen in your test tube setup, close off the opening of the test tube with a cotton ball and
simply place her away on a shelf or dark location somewhere. You won’t have to worry about
her nor feed her at all for a few weeks until she has her first round of nanitics. Some ant
keepers like to give their queens that extra nourishment boost by placing a tiny drop of honey
inside the test tube using a tooth pick (not too big or she will get stuck in it) or by placing a
crushed insect body part (insect leg, head, etc.). This however may possibly stress the queen
which may cause her to cease egg-laying or even eat her eggs! It also can cause mold outbreaks
if the food is left in the test tube for a long time. As a rule of thumb in ant keeping, if your
queen is resting in a test tube founding her colony, it’s best to put her away where there are no
~ 29 ~
major vibrations, and simply leave her in peace. You may check on her every few days, but
frequently jarring her in her test tube can cause unnecessary stress.
Semi-claustral Ant Species
There are some ant species which fall under the category of semi-claustral ant species.
This means that instead of complete sealing herself off from the world after settling in to her
underground chamber, she still creates a little opening through which she can leave and
venture out to forage and hunt for food herself. She acts sort of like a worker during this
period. She will proceed to lay her eggs in her chamber, but like a bird travel back and forth to
and from the nest as she brings food back to her growing young. When the first nanitics arrive,
she will then remain within the nest to assume her sole position of colony egg-layer.
In this case of queen, you have two options for test tube rearing. You can either
confine her to your test tube setup, blocking off the entrance of the test tube with a cotton ball,
and simply continuing to feed her every few days by placing food directly into the test tube; or
the other better option is to attach her test tube to a basin or some sort of larger foraging area
where she can wander around in search of food. You can attach the test tube setup and basin
via a tube, or if you don’t have a connecting tube, you can simply place the entire test tube in
the basin. Throughout this founding process you will have to place food in her basin for her to
find so she can nourish herself and her growing larvae. She will venture out to forage
periodically and return to her test tube to rest and feed her young.
Warmth
As another rule of thumb, ants that are kept warm grow faster. It is important that you
keep your queen at room temperature in the least. A queen ant kept in an air conditioned room
takes a very long time to found her colony. A queen and beginning colony kept at a few degrees
above room temperature develop much faster. One way to keep a colony heated is by placing
the tip of the test tube setup (the water side) onto a reptile heat pad or heating cable. Make
sure the heating pad or cable is the lowest wattage available. It should be just warm enough to
place on your lips for a couple minutes and not hurt, but not any hotter. You don’t want to cook
your ants and doing so can be easy with heating equipment that is too strong.
~ 30 ~
Unmated Queens
Every ant keeper’s worry during the colony founding process is that the queen they have
captured was unable to successfully mate during her nuptial flight. These queens are useless to
an ant keeper because non-inseminated, unfertilized queens cannot produce an ant colony. It is
often difficult to tell with certainty if a queen ant caught during nuptial flight has mated. Even
after the queen may have already broken off her wings and eventually laid eggs in your test
tube setup, it still isn’t an indication that she has mated and will be able to give you a full colony
of ants. A queen that has not mated will lay eggs and these eggs will actually develop into male
ants! Yes, male alates!
The reason for this is the nature of ant genes. The sex of an ant is determined by the
number of chromosomes. Male ants are haploid, meaning they possess 1 set of chromosomes
while female ants (which include queens and worker ants) are diploid, meaning they possess 2
sets of chromosomes. When a successful mating occurs the queen is able to produce viable
worker ants (and queen alates later on) through the combining of 1 set of her chromosomes
within her egg and the 1 set of chromosomes from the male's sperm, thus creating a diploid
(i.e. 2 sets of chromosomes) ant – a female. Hence, if a queen hasn't mated, the only ants she
can give birth to are males, because there is no sperm to add a 2nd set of chromosomes which
creates the female ant. If your new queen ant gives rise to males as her first set of ants, you
know she hadn't mated during the nuptial flight, and you can release her.
Signs Your Queen Has Mated
The good news is, the odds are in your favour, and in the experience of the author
approximately 60 - 80% of the queen ants collected during nuptial flights turn out to be mated
ants. It is for this reason that it is a good idea to attempt capturing several queen ants during
nuptial flight season. Hopefully one, if not most or all of the queens will have been fertilized.
When you first capture her, you can obviously be 100% sure your queen is fertilized if
you’re lucky enough to catch her while she’s actually mating with a male (or males). Also, on
the day that you capture a queen, a sign that your queen may have mated is if she frequently
gives special attention to cleaning the tip of her gaster. If she's giving that area some extra
~ 31 ~
attention, you know a male may have been there previously. Perhaps the best sign of
insemination occurs during her time in the test tube; if the queen’s gaster grows like a balloon
to the point where you can see the white membrane connecting the segments of the gaster, a
condition ant keepers call “termite gaster” which is caused by the rapid production of eggs
within her gaster.
However, even if your queen ant wasn’t caught mating, doesn’t seem like she cares to
clean the tip of her gaster much, nor shows evidence of termite gaster, do not give up hope as
she can still be a fertilized queen.
Egg-laying and Colony Founding Timeline
The time it takes for a queen to lay her eggs depends on factors like what species she is,
how warm she is kept, and how generally comfortable she is in your test tube setup. Egg-laying
can happen almost immediately within a day or two after she is placed in her test tube setup;
or the process can take several weeks or even months, as is the case for ants whose nuptial
flights fall closer to winter and hibernate through the winter before egg-laying in the spring, e.g.
Lasius neoniger of North America. In North America, Lasius neoniger whose nuptial flights occur
around the beginning of September will remain in their test tube setup egg-less until around
March the following year (More on hibernating ants later). Most species however take around
10 days to start egg-laying. For any ant keeper, seeing shiny white eggs in the test tube setup is
an exciting event!
The time it takes for eggs to hatch into larvae, to pupate, and finally become fullgrown workers also depends on species, warmth, and the queen’s overall comfort. It can take
as little as just over a week or two to a couple months.
Brood Boosting
It is easy for ant keepers to grow impatient with getting a nice-sized colony going, so
some ant keepers resort to something called brood boosting. Brood boosting is a technique
involving the collection of pupae (and some ant keepers collect larvae and eggs, too) from a
wild established nest of the same species, and supplementing the test-tubed queen with the
~ 32 ~
additional brood. The queen will typically adopt these pupae. Never introduce worker ants from
a mature colony to your queen! They will fight.
If you are a beginner, we recommend do not attempt brood boosting as it could result in
death if there is a species mismatch (though there have been several documented cases of
brood boosting colonies and queens of different species but same genera). There is also the
chance of spread of virus, disease, or parasites from the brood of the wild colony to your
queen.
Whatever the case, brood boosting is something that should be done with care and
should not be done until your queen has already begun her egg-laying. It is a technique typically
used only for queens that have trouble raising their first set of young, e.g. queens that keep
eating their eggs and larvae. It is highly encouraged to simply stick to having your colony grow
naturally, just to be on the safe side. Patience is so important when caring for ants. The results
are well worth the wait!
Feeding The Growing Colony
Seeing your first nanitic emerge from its pupal stage, a process called eclosing, is
another very rewarding sight for any ant keeper! For the first several hours this worker is
usually lighter in colouration and often frail-looking. During this period their exoskeleton is still
hardening and they usually are not interested in food. After about a day or two, the nanitic may
or may not be interested in food.
A good time to feed the new colony for the first time is when three or more
nanitics have eclosed (unless the queen only has one or two nanitics but no pupae or eggs, in
which case you can go ahead and feed the ants). Do not worry, the ants will not starve and will
continue to receive nourishment from their queen’s regurgitated nutritious soup, in the event
you do not feed your new starting colony for the first few weeks. In the wild, many species of
ants will not have their first real meals until there are as much as ten nantics.
To feed the new colony you may place the food (either a drop of honey or a
crush insect body part) into the test tube and keep the test tube closed off with a cotton ball, or
~ 33 ~
simply give the test tube colony access to a basin by using a connecting tube or by simply
placing the open-ended test tube into a basin. You will have to place food into the basin for the
nanitics who will begin to forage. If you were housing a semi-claustral species, this is the setup
you’ve been managing all along, so just continue to feed as usual (instead of the queen going
out to forage it will now be the nanitics). Always remember to always remove any uneaten food
after a couple days, especially if you are placing food directly into a test tube setup. Food laying
around can cause dangerous mold outbreaks.
The nantics will eat the food and return to feed their queen and the growing young, and
this will be the new process of feeding from now.
Changing dried out or moldy test tubes
Sometimes the cotton creating the water portion of the test tube setup dries out or gets
moldy. Mold can be dangerous to your queen and her colony. When a mold outbreak begins to
occur you will have to give the queen a chance to move out into another test tube set up. One
way to do this is to tape two test tube setups together, and simply waiting the few hours to a
few weeks for her to move her and her young to the new clean, refilled test tube. The move is
made easier if she already has workers because they tend to be more prompt at ensuring the
colony moves to cleaner nesting areas. Another technique is to simply place both test tubes
with their openings close together into a larger container and simply allowing the workers to
move on their own when they want. This setup also is a great way to feed the ants as they
spend their first few months in a test tube. You simply place food into the container, which acts
as a basin.
When to Move Queen and Colony into a Formicarium
When your queen has several adult workers, usually between 10 – 20 workers or when
the ants clearly are not fitting in the test tube anymore, you can then proceed to move the
colony into their formicarium. If you live in an area that experiences winter, and you’ve
captured your queen anytime between late summer and fall, it’s usually a good idea to keep
your colony in a test tube where they can hibernate. That way, you don’t have to worry about
lack of moisture during hibernation. A dry environment with no water during the winter months
~ 34 ~
can be fatal for ants, and housing a colony in a test tube is the most convenient option
available.
As a rule of thumb, ant colonies with many workers are the easiest to move into a
formicarium. There is more ant power to relocate the young, to search and explore the new
nest you provide for them, and generally create a bigger “buzz” when the new nesting site is
discovered. It also helps
Techniques to Encourage the Move
When you are ready to move the colony into your formicarium, you simply fixate the
test tube opening in a manner that it is as close to the entrance of the nest as possible. Then
you simply wait and hope for the best. Because the ants and young are so small it’s best that
the ants themselves are the ones that move the colony out of the test tube and into your
formicarium; do not attempt to manually move the colony yourself.
If your ant species prefers a moist nest, it helps to make the formicarium moist. Also,
most ants prefer dark areas so cover the nest and shine a bright light onto the test tube so they
feel exposed. The process of moving can often take a very long time, as in several weeks to
months depending on how stubborn and attached your colony is to their test tube. It usually
helps if the test tube is dried out and has no water.
Some like to use heat for immediate relocation of the colony, a process which
involves placing the entire test tube onto a hot heating pad or heating cable and forcing the
ants to move out due to the uncomfortable heat. Using heat to force your ants to move out of
their test tube can be dangerous, so if you are a beginner, we highly recommend that you
simply allow your ants to move into your nest when they wish. Once again, patience is the key!
Polymorphism and Alates
Many ants have workers that are polymorphic. This means that there is more than one
variation of worker. In most cases, polymorphic species of ants have normal-sized workers and
very large-sized workers with very large heads known as majors, which often times are in
charge of defense, breaking down large food items, and other tasks which require extra
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mandible power. In some species like those belonging to the genus Pheidole and Camponotus
the degree of polymorphism is great with several denominations of workers, including minors
(extra small workers usually in charge of caring for the young, but not in all species), ordinary
workers, submajors (moderately large workers with somewhat larger heads), majors (large
workers with larger heads), and supermajors (largest workers with the largest heads in the
colony).
Owning a polymorphic species of ant can make observation extra interesting. If you own
a polymorphic ant species, you can expect your first major to appear later in colony
development, e.g. after the colony has grown to around 100 workers. Feed your colony well
they can support the very nutrient expensive majors. You can refer to Chapter 12 to find out if
the species you have is polymorphic.
Also when your colony has reached a certain size, usually after a year or more, you will
begin to see alates appear in your colony. These are the winged male and female reproductive
ants which typically wait within the nest until the nuptial flight season of the particular species.
Alates appear also in accordance to how much food is provided, because like majors, alates are
nutrient expensive, requiring more protein and nutrients to form.
In the Author’s experience, these alates usually fail to have mating flights within the
formicarium or basin. The reason for this is because indoors, ants usually do not have the
environmental cues (e.g. temperature cues, humidity cues, seasonal cues, pheromonal cues
carried by the wind from neighbouring colonies of the same species) which tell a colony that it
is mating season. As a result, in most cases, you will have male and female alates leave and reenter the nest randomly regardless of the time of year, and the young queens will even break
off their wings as if they have mated, only to return to the nest and start acting like workers.
Males will even die after wandering about in the basin, as if they have mated.
With that being said, there have been isolated reports within the global online ant
keeping community that mating flights can sometimes happen within captivity, either inside the
formicarium or in the basin. Some ant keepers like to simply place their formicarium and basin
outside and leave them uncovered (with petroleum jelly or baby powder mixed with alcohol
~ 36 ~
smothered in a thick band around the top to keep the rest of the colony in) to allow the alates
to fly off as they would in the wild. If you do this, make sure the ant enclosure is still in a shaded
and relatively protected place away from direct sunlight and rain.
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Chapter 7: Feeding Your Ant Colony & Ant Nutrition
One of the factors that will determine the success and rapid growth of your colony is
food availability. A colony that is doing poorly can usually be traced to poor nutrition and/or
lack of water. In ant nutrition, there are three basic components: a protein food source, a sweet
or carbohydrate food source, and water. Ants will require you to provide sustenance from all
three of these components.
Food items should be placed into your basin for the ants to stumble upon. When a
worker ant finds the food you have set for them, it will instantly get excited and will
immediately cover the area with pheromones to signal to other ants that food was found. If the
food item shows signs of movement the worker ant will release the necessary pheromones
(and in some species, vibrations) to call for backup. Only when a food item is still and nonthreatening will it then proceed to eat what it can, fill its social stomach and make its way back
to the nest laying a pheromone trail on the way. When it returns to the nest, it immediately lets
the colony know it has found food by vibrating and releasing pheromones, and it excites
surrounding hungry workers, causing them to venture off in search of the food, instinctively
following the pheromone trail laid down by the original ant (Random fact: only the oldest
worker ants, the senior citizens of the colony, are allowed to leave the nest). As more and more
ants find the food, fill their social stomachs, and return to the nest, they also each leave a
corresponding pheromone trail. The growing number of ants that enforce this pheromone trail
making it stronger and stronger, signals to other ants that there really is a good find at the end
of the trail. This system of locating food is why it only takes one ant to find your sandwich at a
picnic before droves of ants appear in just a few minutes.
When the food source gets depleted out or is completely consumed, ants no longer
leave a pheromone trail back to the nest, and the pheromone trail eventually dissipates, telling
other ants that the food has been exhausted, and the pheromone trail is no longer worth
following.
~ 38 ~
Ants with full social stomachs returning to the nest proceed to transfer food from
mouth to mouth to other workers in the nest (the process called trophallaxis), and the food
gets distributed to all members of the colony including the larvae, alates if any, and the queen.
Protein
All ant colonies require a protein food source. Proteins are chains of amino acids that
form the building blocks of life. Protein allows the queen to continually produce eggs and the
larvae to continually grow. Protein is the primary material needed for an ant colony to expand.
Protein is also the determining factor in whether or not a colony is ready to sustain alates. Only
a colony that is fed plenty of protein will begin to have alates appear in the colony. Alates, i.e.
young queens and males, are usually larger than worker ants and require a lot more ‘matter’ to
form, so naturally a queen will not produce eggs that will become alates if there isn’t ample
protein and other necessary nutrients required for nutrient-expensive alate production.
Most ants will readily accept insects as a protein source. Generally, anyone who has
owned a reptile, amphibian, or other insectivorous pet knows how much of a hassle it is to
continually deal with living feeder insects, unless you’re the type of person that enjoys making
regular trips to the pet store and/or dealing with the smelly, often gnat-infested containers
housing these prey insects. For this reason, if your ants will accept non-living protein
alternatives, it makes things a lot easier for you as an ant keeper! Before offering fresh insects,
see if your ants will accept pre-packaged, freeze dried insects, or store your pet store feeder
insects in the fridge. Before feeding the fridge-stored insects, crush them then place them in
the basin. If the ants still show interest in the fridge-stored prey insects, you’re set! You won’t
have to deal with the extra hassle of housing and feeding the feeder insects, and you only need
to buy a whole bag of feeder insects at once and simply place them in the fridge to use up
gradually as needed. Also see if your ants will accept cooked fish, shellfish, meat, or eggs. Try
dog or cat food or even fish flakes. Make sure anything you choose to feed your ants is natural
and chemical-free.
If your ants show no interest in the protein sources listed above, it means they prefer
their protein food sources ‘juicy’ and freshly killed. The reason most ants require the insects to
~ 39 ~
be fresh is because most ants lack the chewing mouthparts required to properly breakdown
tough exoskeleton. Instead, worker ants will prefer to suck the juices that spew from a dead
insect, and simply discard the exoskeleton. There are some species of ants that will drag excess
exoskeleton or even the whole dead insect prey into the nest to give to the larvae, who in fact
do have the ample chewing mouthparts to mash up very solid food. These larvae then
regurgitate what they’ve consumed in a semi-solid mash, to feed the adult workers. It’s a
system that ensures both larvae and adult ants receive food.
It is recommended that you feed store-bought prey insects like crickets, mealworms,
superworms, waxworms, silkworms, etc. Also, although it can be fun to watch live insects
wriggle as they’re being mauled by an aggressive and hungry ant colony, perhaps some might
argue that it is cruel to do so; pre-killing the insects may be a more humane choice. Another
reason to pre-kill prey insects before offering them to your ants is because you can be sure
there are no ant casualties. The freshly killed or scalded insects are to be placed in the colony’s
basin for the ants to stumble across. Ants will usually have favourites so be sure to keep a close
record of which food prey items your ants like the best and continue to feed them. The left over
exoskeletons will be left in a neat pile in your basin for you to clean up. Be sure to dispose of
this piled up insect refuse at least once a week.
As much as possible, avoid feeding your ants wild-caught insects. You risk the fatal
presence of pesticides. The author has lost entire colonies in the past attributed to the frequent
feeding of swatted flies from the yard. Many wild insects can be carriers of pesticides even
while alive, and it accumulates in greater concentrations within the bodies of the predators that
consume them. All it takes is a single wild-caught insect loaded with pesticides to wipe out an
entire ant colony.
Carbohydrate
The second component to ant nutrition is a sugar-source or carbohydrate.
Carbohydrates offer your ants the energy needed to perform their daily tasks. Although the
queen, alates, and larvae do benefit from the energy offered from carbohydrate food sources,
the primary benefactors of these carbohydrate foods are the worker ants, who continuously
~ 40 ~
work over a 24 hour cycle only taking a couple hundred 2 minute naps. An ant colony that is fed
a steady supply of carbohydrate, sugary food sources is a very active and healthy colony with
lively and hardy workers.
Examples of commonly accepted carbohydrate food sources include honey, maple
syrup, nectar, fresh fruit, and sugar-water. These food sources should also be placed into your
outworld, ideally in a shallow dish or placed onto a small piece of paper to make it easier for
you to clean afterwards. The author likes to use bottle caps to hold these carbohydrate foods. If
offering liquids like honey, maple syrup, or sugar-water, make sure it is only a couple drops. It is
easy for ants to drown in a sticky liquid.
If your ants happen to be granivorous (feeding on grains and nuts) you can offer nuts,
bread, seeds, oatmeal, dried dog food, rice, and corn as a carbohydrate source. Again, make
sure any uneaten, leftover food discards are cleaned from your basin once a week.
Water
Water is vital to every living thing on Earth. Ants depend on you for water. Although
many ant colonies can go a few days to a week without either a protein or a carbohydrate food
source, most colonies will perish if they go too long without any water.
Water should be offered to your colony in two ways. First, water should be available to
your colonies from within the nest. With the exception of ant species that naturally live in very
dry nests, most ant colonies prefer a slightly to very moist nest. The ants will often drink water
directly from the nest walls. Second, a test tube full of water with a cotton ball closing off the
end should be placed in your basin for ants to drink. An alternative to this is a water dish with a
sponge in it, but you risk the ants making a nest underneath the sponge or within the small
moist holes. Never let this basin water supply run out!
~ 41 ~
Chapter 8: The Right Ant Environment
Moisture and Humidity
Proper moisture and humidity are important to any formicarium. Establishing just the
right moisture and humidity level is the determining factor in whether or not an ant colony will
move into the simulated nest you’ve provided them. Ants will also drink water directly from the
moist walls of the nest. Nests that are too dry for a species that naturally inhabit moist soils can
be fatal, so be sure to have someone provide your colony nest moisture as needed if ever you
go away on vacation. If not, you may end up coming home to a dead ant colony. Again, placing
one or more test tubes full of water blocked with a cotton ball into the basin is a must.
Most species require a moderately moist nest, but there are some species which prefer
extremely wet or dry nests. Be sure to refer to Chapter 12 for a list of the most commonly kept
ant species and their nest humidity and moisture requirements.
If you are using an AntsCanada Habitat Nest™ providing your nest moisture is made
easy. You only need to pour water into the water reserve every few days to keep the nest
moist.
Heating
A colony that is kept warm grows much quicker and is much more active than an
ant colony that isn’t provided heat. Though heating is not required for most ants, in the least
your formicarium must not drop below room temperature. If it does (e.g. you are keeping the
ants in a place that is air conditioned) you will need to heat your ant colony.
There are several ways to heat a formicarium. One way is to use a reptile heating cable
or heating pad. Be sure when using such equipment, you use the lowest wattage available and
if possible place it on its lowest setting. It is easy to overheat your ant nest and kill your colony
so when installing heat to your ant setup, be sure to observe your ants for the first hour to
make sure they aren’t acting differently, dying, or completely not moving (as a result of
‘estivation’).
~ 42 ~
You should also only heat one section of the nest, so you can establish a temperature
gradient in the nest; some rooms can be warmer than others, and it will allow the ants to
thermoregulate, meaning they can simply choose where to be in the nest according to what
temperature they prefer. In fact, you may notice that your colony will place the pupae in the
hottest areas of the nest, as they do in the wild, to help speed up the pupae development
process.
Another way to provide heating is by using heat lamps, but this is not recommended
simply because they usually are too hot for ants. You may decide to use a heat lamp for the
basin. It will keep your foraging ants warm and active, as well as nicely light your outworld
setup. If you are using an AntsCanada Habitat Outworld™ be sure to keep the top lid open so
the heat from the lamp doesn’t melt the cover.
~ 43 ~
Chapter 9: Annual Hibernation
Prior to the cold winter months, you might notice your ants slowing down activity,
eating and gut-loading themselves as much as they can (many ants species have what are called
‘repletes’, ants completely bloated-looking, designated to be living food storage, most
profoundly observed in Honeypot ants of the genus: Myrmecocystus), and building structures to
restrict or block off nest entrances. The queen stops laying eggs, and often times, all larvae are
fed as much as possible so they become pupae before the onset of winter. During the coldest
months of winter hibernation, the ants are completely still. They are unable to move because of
a lack of heat needed for the biochemical processes enabling movement, as was explored in the
previous chapter. The ants produce glycerol in their hemolymph (ant blood) which acts as an
anti-freeze, allowing some ants to withstand temperatures as low as -40 degrees C for an
extended period of time. When spring finally arrives, the ants usually take a week or more to
“thaw out”, before returning to their active state. Year after year, ant colonies undergo the
mind-boggling miracle of hibernation.
Why Hibernate Ant Colonies
Ant keepers from temperate regions have the unique opportunity to seasonally “put
their ants away” so to speak for a few months every year during ant hibernation period.
Although for new ant keepers, the idea of having an inactive ant colony for 3-4 months of the
year might seem like somewhat of a disappointment, over time the ever increasing ant colony
maintenance and feeding can become quite taxing as the ant colony grows larger and larger.
For this reason, ant keepers truly benefit from the ant hibernation period, because it gives ant
keepers a good break from their ants, allowing you to simply put the ants away and revisit them
in the Spring, keeping the ant keeping experience always fresh. Most advanced ant keepers
who own several ant colonies can attest to this appreciation of the ant hibernation break.
If you are from a temperate region, you will need to hibernate your ants. Even if you
attempt to keep your ants warm through the winter months, and you are caring for an ant
species that naturally experiences winter, you will notice the ants appear to enter a lethargic,
dormant state anyway. The reason for this is they have a biological clock, accurately set to the
~ 44 ~
seasons to which they and their evolutionary ancestors have come to adapt. It is recommended
that you keep your ants cold during the winter, so that your ant colony won’t feel the need to
eat, move, or do anything while their biological clocks are naturally keeping them in ‘shut
down’ mode. As explored in the last chapter, ants that are kept warm are more ‘amped up’ and
are generally hungrier, therefore, to keep your ants from having to deal with the confusing
physiological state of being amped up by heat while simultaneously being in a naturally
occurring dormant state (i.e. being sleepy but being stimulated to be awake), it’s perhaps a
better choice to you keep them cold so they truly shutdown all physiological functions until
Springtime (i.e. being sleepy and allowing them to sleep). It’s also probably the most
comfortable option for your ants who want to truly hibernate.
Also, it is said that hibernating your ants year after year extends the life of the queen,
and therefore your ant colony, giving the queen a chance to take an annual break from the very
demanding task of egg-laying through the warm months.
When to Start and End Hibernation
As a rule of thumb, the Author hibernates his ant colonies when it becomes cold enough
outside that one requires a winter jacket and insects are no longer seen outside, and begins to
encourage ‘wake up’ when it’s warm enough that winter jackets are no longer needed and
when insects are spotted again outside. In Canada, this translates to a hibernation period of
about five months from October to March. The usual hibernation period for most ant species
lasts between 3-5 months, depending on your location and species. Ant colonies undergoing
hibernation should be allowed to hibernate for a minimum of three months.
How to Hibernate
There are several ways to hibernate an ant colony, whether they be queens with young
in a test tube or mature ant colonies in a formicarium. Most ant keepers usually place their test
tubes/formicaria in a basement or other unheated location of the house where it gets cold
during the winter. A maximum temperature of approximately 10 degrees C is required for
hibernation of ants, but most ants hibernate well closer to 0 degrees C depending on where you
are from and the species. If your ants are arboreal, e.g. living in wood like Camponotus, they are
~ 45 ~
usually able to withstand even lower hibernating temperatures, well below freezing. If you are
unsure what temperature to hibernate your ants at, simply try keeping them around 5-10
degrees C over the winter months. If possible the more gradual you can introduce the cold
temperatures, the better it is for the ants, so it’s not so much of a drastic temperature shock. If
you’re choosing to place your ants in the basement or an unheated location in your home,
achieving this gradual cooling is easily achievable as it just naturally gets colder outside.
Another way to hibernate your ant colony is by placing them in a fridge and putting the
temperature at its warmest setting during the winter months. It is usually a good idea to not
leave your formicarium outside where it is exposed to the elements.
During this hibernation period do not panic if the ants look as though they have died,
and have assumed a sort of crumpled-up, fetal position. Many ants when undergoing deep cold
hibernation will appear to curl up and die, when in reality they’re all very much so alive and will
return to their normal active state come Spring.
Also, during this hibernation period it is vital to ensure the ants are provided with
moisture. If your ants are still in a test tube setup, make sure the water portion of the test tube
hasn’t dried. If it has, have them move into a new test tube setup first before hibernating them.
If your ants are in a formicarium, you will need to visit the formicarium every now and then to
add water when needed. During this time you will not have to feed your ant colonies even if
some workers might be seen foraging in the basin.
When it is time to awaken your ants from hibernation in the Spring simply move them
to a warm area, but it is recommended you don’t heat the formicarium up with a heat pad or
cable just yet. Again, the more gradual the process of warming up the colony the better it is for
your ants. If the ants you are waking up are in a test tube, be sure to keep a close eye on the
water for the first hour. Test tubes that are suddenly warmed up often flood the entire test
tube setup when the air bubbles and water in the water reserve expand from the heat. You risk
drowning the queen and her offspring. Be sure to have a test tube setup ready in case you need
to perform a rescue operation in the event of a test tube flood.
~ 46 ~
Do not panic if the ant colony doesn’t appear to wake up right away. Some ants wake up
immediately, while others may assume the crumpled up fetal position for a few weeks to a
whole month before moving again. It depends largely on how cold the ants were kept during
hibernation. If they were hibernated at very cold temperatures, it generally takes longer for the
ants to emerge from hibernation. When your ants do wake up, it’s a good idea to welcome
them back with a tasty meal of honey to nourish them during the several months of fasting
incurred during hibernation.
~ 47 ~
Chapter 10: Nest Cycling and Hygiene
In nature, ants will pile their refuse and dead bodies in piles outside of the nest, or bury
it in chambers within the nest, at which point other decomposers and microorganisms take
over and break down the refuse and dead. Wind and water wash these piles clean. In captivity
however, your ant colony will depend on you to clean up these piles. You will have to play the
role of routine garbage man and undertaker. Refuse and dead ants left lying around for too
long leads to fungi and bacteria growth which endanger your colony.
Most ant keepers will spot clean their basins by simply scooping up dead ants and refuse
up with a spoon. Make a habit of doing this on a weekly basis at least. Ants like to stick their
garbage and dead bodies onto sticky surfaces like petroleum jelly. If you notice the ants placing
their refuse and dead onto the petroleum jelly band used along the top of the basin, it might be
worth placing a piece of paper with a blob of petroleum jelly on it, so the ants can be
encouraged to place their refuse and dead onto something you can simply throw away later.
Another useful apparatus is the micro vacuum tool used to suck up dust from laptop
keyboards. Be sure to not suck up any living ants!
If possible, during hibernation ever year, giving the basin a good wash using mild soap
and water is a great idea.
Cycling Nests Every Few Years
In the wild, soil is constantly circulating. Soil is brought to the surface by the ants, other
organisms within the soil, move the soil particles about, and ant nests also tend to move and
change shape and location. In captivity however, allowing for this same refreshment of nest
media can be challenging.
This is why it is encouraged that you routinely cycle your ant nests every two years or
so. This means you have your ants move into a completely new formicarium so their old
formicarium can air out and return to a neutral PH. A colony will thrive if you continuously
allow the ants to live in a fresh nest. For moving techniques, simply refer to the colony
relocation tips of Chapter 6.
~ 48 ~
Keeping Your Ants Free of Parasites
Believe it or not, even ants have to worry about external parasites like ticks and mites.
In ant keeping, there have been several reports of mites infesting the bodies of queens. The
best way to keep your colonies free of parasites, such as mites, is to avoid placing sticks, wood,
dirt, and rocks from outside into your ants’ living space. Always wash your hands thoroughly
when working with your ant colony, and be sure to thoroughly clean any and all instruments
like tweezers, test tubes, etc. before using them.
~ 49 ~
Chapter 11: Conservation, Preservation, and Education
How People Can Save Ants
Ants are so tied to the plants and animals around them, that caring for ants in the wild
necessarily means caring for all the living things in their given ecosystem. There are plants that
depend on specific ant species for seed dispersal, pollination, and even protection. Ants are
very important decomposers, breaking down decaying matter, plants, and animals. Ants keep
soil circulating as they construct their subterranean nests. In many areas, ants are a very
important predator, controlling insect and small animal populations in an ecosystem.
Many animals have established very close symbiotic relationships with ants. An example
is a tiny blind, eyeless white crustacean known as a white woodlouse, that lives in ant nests and
feeds on ant droppings and fungus. Its scientific name is Platyarthrus hoffmannseggi and they
are only found in ant nests, rarely coming above ground. The ants benefit from their presence,
and the white woodlice benefit from the ants through the ants’ provision of refuge, food, and
protection.
The main way to protect ants in the wild is to protect their habitat. Habitat conservation
is a great way to preserve ant populations, as it keeps all the interconnected flora and fauna
thriving, and when an entire ecosystem is thriving, so too are ant populations. Planting trees,
creating conservation areas, allowing naturally occurring plants and weeds to grow in certain
spots around your outdoor property can help encourage ant populations to flourish. Of course
using eco-friendly products and refraining from using pesticides also allow ant life to thrive.
There are many ways online in which you can help preserve the environment and the
ants that are such an important component to it. It should be remembered that acting locally
creates global effects. Start within your own community and protect the ants that live around
you by conserving the environment around you.
~ 50 ~
Myrmecology and Websites
Myrmecology, the scientific study of ants is an ever advancing branch of biology;
more and more young minds are seeking to pursue a career in studying ants on various
capacities, e.g. taxonomy (discovering and cataloguing new species), academia (e.g. ecological,
biological, entomological research), and agricultural studies.
www.AntsCanada.com is a great website for all information pertaining to ants
and myrmecology. It has a forum full of both advanced and beginner ant keepers, sharing their
knowledge, experiences, advice, and photos of their ants. It also provides all the latest
information and top-of-the-line products for pet ant keeping. If you register with the site, you
also have access to the ant chat. Also be sure to subscribe to the regular updates on the latest
AntsCanada news.
Be sure to also join the largest Facebook ant group entitled the Ultimate Ants and
Myrmecology Facebook page hosted by AntsCanada. On YouTube be sure to subscribe to
www.Youtube.com/Antscanada for regular ant videos and tutorials. Be sure to also follow
AntsCanada on Twitter for the latest news on AntsCanada, ants, and new ant products.
Another highly recommended website for advanced ant keepers is www.Antweb.org
which is an all-inclusive global catalogue listed by region of all the documented species of ants
in the world. It also offers an annual class in the Unites States, called ‘Ant Course’, taken by
entomologists, university students, professionals working with ants, etc. It is run by Dr. Brian L.
Fisher at the California Academy of Science in San Francisco, California.
~ 51 ~
Chapter 12: Caresheets (Listed by Species)
The following are basic caresheets that have been compiled based on experience with
caring for various ant species reared at our Ant Nursery in Toronto, Canada, as well as by
knowledgeable ant enthusiasts, ant keeping pros, and customers. It should be noted that all
care details such as ideal temperature and moisture may vary depending on location. If you
have had long-term success with a particular ant species from your area (especially if housed in
our products) and are interested in contributing to this caresheet database, we would like to
hear about it to possibly add to this database! Feel free to email us your success ant stories and
findings at contact-us@Antscanada.com. Special thanks to Mr. Chris Murrow, Mr. Alex
Ukrainets, Mr. David Luong, Chris, and Chuck for contributions to this ant database. Habitat
information from AntWeb and Wikipedia.
Aphaenogaster fulva
Common name(s): Harvester Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral, Monogynous
Nuptial Flight: September (North America)
Habitat: This species is found nesting in mesic forest, oak woodland, in rotten logs and stumps.
Ideal nest moisture level: 50-80% moist.
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water, granivorous
Nest Temperature: 20-24 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-24 degrees C
Note: In the wild, Aphaenogaster fulva go for mostly living and dead food items that are
manageable such as termites and assorted insects. They are easy to keep and like their nests
moist! Many species of plants depend on this species of ant for the dispersal of seeds.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
~ 52 ~
Camponotus americanus
Common name(s): Carpenter Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral. Monogynous.
Nuptial Flight: April (North America)
Habitat: Occurs in dry and dry-mesic prairie and oak savanna. Less often it occurs in more closed
woodlands. It nests deep in soil, usually independent of an external covering, but occasionally
builds a large chamber beneath a stone, bark slab or wood in the early stages of decomposition.
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-40% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 22-25 degrees C (room temperature)
Outworld Temperature: 20-27 degrees C (they like cool temperatures and won’t come out often at
28+ C )
Notes: Beautiful ants with black yellow black coloration. No heating is needed around room
temperature is ideal. These ants will accept some spiders, crickets, and meal worms.
Photos: queen worker major male
Video: colony
Camponotus chromaiodes
Common name(s): Red Carpenter Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral. Monogynous.
Nuptial Flight: April, May, June (North America)
Habitat: Occurs in remnant dry-mesic to mesic oak woodland and forest, where it nests in soil and
concentrates its nest around or in the dead centers of stumps or wood in various stages of
decomposition. It also nests in hollows in dead wood in tree trunks near the base of living trees,
including eastern red cedar. Compared to C. pennsylvanicus, this ant occupies the drier portion of
the moisture spectrum of Missouri woodlands, though the two species occur together at many
mesic localities, especially if they are somewhat open.
Ideal nest moisture level: 10%-30% moist (can be kept in a completely dry nest)
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 22-28 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: These ants will benefit from a heated nest. Heating is not needed but without it, the colony
develops at a slower rate. These ants will accept some spiders, crickets, super worms and meal
worms.
~ 53 ~
Photos: queen worker major male
Video: colony
Camponotus noveboracensis
Common name(s): Red Carpenter Ants, New York Carpenter Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral. Monogynous.
Nuptial Flight: May, August (North America)
Habitat: Nests in and around dead wood
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-30% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 23-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: These ants will benefit from a heated nest. Heating is not necessary but without it, one can
expect the colony development to be slow. These ants will readily accept crickets and mealworms.
Photos: queen worker major male
Video: colony
Camponotus pennsylvanicus
Common name(s): Carpenter Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral. Monogynous.
Nuptial Flight: April, May, June, July (North America)
Habitat: Very likely the most abundant and least ecologically conservative Camponotus throughout
its range, C. pennsylvanicus species lives in virtually all types of habitats with at least some
standing dead wood, ranging from fields with wooden fence posts to suburban yards to savannas
and woodlands to pristine upland and floodplain forests. Nests are usually in dead wood of living
trees, less often in standing snags, in stumps, or in the ground beneath fallen dead wood
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-30% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 23-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: These ants will benefit from a heated nest. Heating is not necessary but without it, one can
expect the colony development to be slow. These ants will readily accept crickets and mealworms.
Photos: queen worker major male
Video: colony
~ 54 ~
Camponotus vicinus
Common name(s): Carpenter Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral. Possibly polygynous.
Nuptial Flight: May, July (North America)
Habitat: Nests in and around dead wood
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-30% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 23-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: These ants will benefit from a heated nest. Heating is not necessary but without it, one can
expect the colony development to be slow. These ants will readily accept crickets and mealworms.
Photos: queen worker major male
Video:-
Crematogaster cerasi
Common name(s): Acrobat Ants
Difficulty Level: Medium
Queen: Fully claustral
Nuptial Flight: August, September (North America)
Habitat: Occurs in dry to mesic woodland, including second growth and highly disturbed portions,
and in all wetness levels of savanna, prairie and old field. It nests in wood in the early to mid-stages
of decomposition, in the bases of clumping grasses, in soil beneath rocks or even beneath wood or
even large hunks of charcoal in burned woodlands.
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-40% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: These ants can be easy to culture but require a very escape-proof setup. These ants can
burrow through wood and are voracious eaters requiring a great deal of food. They impressively
arch their gasters over their heads to spray formic acid in defense or attacking. The colouring of
this species can range between reddish (with black gaster) to completely black.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
~ 55 ~
Formica fusca
Common name(s): Black Field Ants, Black Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: In captivity, pleometrotic and possibly polygynous via oligogyny, however safest and best
kept singly. Fully claustral.
Nuptial Flight: July (North America)
Habitat: Nests in a variety of different soil types and wooded environments, usually in areas with
good drainage and receiving a considerable amount of sun.
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-40% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Ideal AntsCanada Nest/Outworld: Habitat Nest series, Pumice Stone Ant Nest, Microhabitat
Outworld, Habitat Outworld
Notes: These ants may not readily accept crickets/mealworms, and may require other insect
options, including wild-caught prey.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
Formica subsericea
Common name(s): Black Field Ants, Black Ants
Difficulty Level: Medium
Queen: In captivity, pleometrotic and possibly polygynous via oligogyny, however safest and best
kept singly. Fully claustral.
Nuptial Flight: July (North America)
Habitat: Found in virtually all mesic habitats, but most common in wooded and woodland edge
sites
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-40% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: Colonies of this species are often slow to start up. Large and impressive for Formica.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
~ 56 ~
Lasius alienus
Common name(s): Cornfield Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral. Monogynous.
Nuptial Flight: June, July. Flights occur in the afternoons. (North America)
Habitat: Nesting in shaded areas in deciduous forest under stones and in rotting logs.
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-50% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: Very hardy and active species. Small in size. These ants may or may not readily accept
crickets/mealworms, and may require other insect options.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
Lasius neoniger
Common name(s): Labour Day Ants, Cornfield Ants, Nuisance Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral. Monogynous.
Nuptial Flight: August, September, October. Flights occur in the afternoons and happen especially
around Labour Day (North America)
Habitat: Nesting in open habitats, including lawns and sidewalks
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-50% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: Very hardy and active species. Small in size. These ants may or may not readily accept
crickets/mealworms, and may require other insect options. Nuptial flights typically occur around
Labour Day, hence one of the common names.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
~ 57 ~
Lasius niger
Common name(s): Common Black Garden Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Fully claustral. Monogynous.
Nuptial Flight: August, September, October (North America) / July, August (Europe)
Habitat: Nests underground, commonly found under stones, but also in rotten deadwood
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-50% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: Very hardy and active species. Small in size. The ‘golden retrievers’ of the ant world, these
ants make good standard species for novice ant keepers.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
Myrmica rubra
Common name(s): European Fire Ants, Ruby Ants, Red Ants
Difficulty Level: Difficult
Queen: Polygynous, semi-claustral (meaning queens will need to forage during colony founding
stage)
Nuptial Flight: Sporadic nuptial flights throughout the year (North America) / July, August,
September (Europe)
Habitat: Found in virtually all habitats, but most common in grassland and ruderal sites. Nests in
soil, under rocks and dead wood, in grass turf, moss, peat and very small loam hills
Ideal nest moisture level: 60-90% moist
Diet: highly insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: Nest: 20-25 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: This is a very aggressive and stinging species. Colonies can get very large in multi-queen
colonies. Semi-nomadic and may benefit from one or more satellite nests. Nests should be kept
very damp and maintained around room temperature for best results. These ants are voracious
eaters, are highly insectivorous, and require lots of insects as well as sugar/honeywater. Queens
are polygynous and are semi-claustral so must be allowed to forage for food during the founding
stage.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
~ 58 ~
Pheidole pilifera
Common name(s): Big-Headed Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Polygynous, fully claustral
Nuptial Flight: June, July, August (North America)
Habitat: Sand prairie, sandy old field, or other sandy or other highly-drained, acid soil habitats
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-50% moist
Diet: granivorous, insectivorous
Nest Temperature: 20-25 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Note: This ant is very tiny and should be handled with extreme care. This ant benefits from
incubation in captivity, otherwise colonies remain small.
Photos: queen worker major male
Video:-
Pogonomyrmex californicus
Common name(s): Harvester Ants, Red Harvester Ants, commonly mistakenly called fire
ants
Difficulty Level: Medium
Queen: Obligate forager, Monogynous
Nuptial Flight: June, July (North America)
Habitat: This species is found nesting in open, warm, sandy areas. The nests themselves are
constructed in the soil, generally in areas fully exposed to the sun. Some are beneath stones,
whereas others are surmounted by soil craters or by small to huge mounds with or without
coverings of gravel.
Ideal nest moisture level: 10-30% moist. Seed chamber should be dry to prevent rotting.
Diet: granivorous, insectivorous, honey water/sugar water, will take betta pellets (fish food)
Nest Temperature: 23-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Note: Founding queens should be kept at higher humidity levels (30-40%) and because they are
obligate foragers, must be fed during the founding stage. These ants will benefit from a heated
nest. Heating is not necessary but without it, one can expect the colony development to be slow.
Very painful sting, handle with care. Not great climbers, won’t be able to climb up smooth surfaces.
Mature Colony size approximately 10,000.
Photos: queen worker male
Video:-
~ 59 ~
Ponera pennsylvanica
Common name(s): Difficulty Level: Medium
Queen: Semi-claustral, Monogynous
Nuptial Flight: September (North America)
Habitat: Usually abundant wherever there is moist, at least moderately rich soil, whether shaded or
open, moist to dry-mesic, and even in highly degraded habitats such as lawns, gardens, fencerows,
successional fields and thickets. P. pennsylvanica also occurs in sedge hummocks in fens. In
prairie, it nests in the root-zone of sedges or grasses. In woodland, it nests in soil, in soft, rotten
wood, and often in old acorns or occasionally other nuts.
Ideal nest moisture level: 50-90% moist.
Diet: insectivorous (specialized diet: see notes)
Nest Temperature: 21-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 21-27 degrees C
Note: They are not a good beginner species, but great for an experience keeper looking for
something a little different. They require a higher than normal level of humidity in their nest and
have a specialized diet. They are strictly predacious and will not eat honey or other sweets. They
will only eat soft bodied arthropods. In the wild they mainly eat spring tails and other soft bodied
prey they find while foraging under rocks, logs, or even underground. They will readily accept
termites, silverfish, some spiders, fruit flies and pin head (baby) crickets in captivity. They tend to
refuse to eat other types of invertebrates, even crushed. They will accept their food frozen and don’t
seem to mind foraging above ground in captivity. They don’t require nearly as high of a humidity
level in their foraging area as they do in their nest.
Photos: queen worker male
Video:-
~ 60 ~
Prenolepis imparis
Common name(s): Winter Ants, False Honeypot Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Polygynous, fully claustral
Nuptial Flight: March, April, May (North America)
Habitat: This species occurs in natural remnants and human-modified habitats. In the U.S. South
(including most of Missouri), P. imparis is a forest or shade-inhabiting ant, but to the north it is also
common in prairies and other open habitats. In Missouri, it is most often associated with oaks and
clay-loam soils, and is less common in second-growth forests, particularly those lacking or with
poor representation of oaks.
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-50% moist
Diet: insectivorous, sugar/honey water
Nest Temperature: 15-25 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 15-25 degrees C
Note: Queens only lay one batch of eggs each year. It’s likely they need a cold period for several
weeks to trigger egg laying. They are otherwise easy to keep but get largely inactive for periods at a
time.
Photos: queen worker replete male
Video: colony
Solenopsis invicta
Common name(s): Fire Ants, Red Imported Fire Ants (RIFA)
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Polygynous, fully claustral
Nuptial Flight: April, May, June (North America)
Habitat: Disturbed, including seasonally inundated ground, typically not common in pristine
remnant natural areas, except annually flooded areas. Notorious for nesting among the urban
setting.
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-50% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Photos: queen worker major male
Video: colony
~ 61 ~
Solenopsis molesta
Common name(s): Thief Ant
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Polygynous, fully claustral
Nuptial Flight: May, July, September, October (North America)
Habitat: Subterranean. Nests in virtually all well-drained soils, even floodplains.
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-50% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water, granivorous
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: This ant is very tiny and should be handled with extreme care.
Photos: queen worker male
Video:-
Solenopsis xyloni
Common name(s): Southern Fire Ant
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Possibly polygynous but only about 40% of colonies remain polygynous long term
(elimination of all but one queen usually occurs), fully claustral
Nuptial Flight: June, July (North America), as early as end of February in California
Habitat: Subterranean. Nests in virtually all well-drained soils, even floodplains. Will not inhabit bark
or fallen timbre.
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-50% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water, granivorous especially sunflower seeds
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: These ants are very easy to keep but are notorious escape artists, requiring a very secure
formicarial setup. This species is a stinging fire ant native to southern parts of the United States. Its
behavior is similar to the red imported fire ant ( S. invicta), although its sting is less painful.
Photos: queen worker major male
Video: colony
~ 62 ~
Tapinoma sessile
Common name(s): Odorous House Ants
Difficulty Level: Medium
Queen: polygynous, possibly fully claustral
Nuptial Flight: May, June (North America)
Habitat: Found in virtually all habitats, but most common in riparian, grassland and ruderal sites.
Impermanent nests in preformed cavities and spaces. It is notorious for nesting in homes and for
being common domestic pests.
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-40% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Ideal AntsCanada Nest/Outworld: Notes: This species is notorious for escaping. They nest opportunistically by nature and move
often. Wild colonies have been known to inhabit homes and will harass captive colonies. Crushing
the ant will produce a strong odor very much like blue cheese.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
Temnothorax curvispinosus
Common name(s): Acorn Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Possibly semi-polygynous, fully clusteral
Nuptial Flight: June, July, August, September (North America)
Habitat: Found nesting in tight spaces, including inside of acorns
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-40% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: In the wild colonies sometimes band together in the winter time. The next spring they divide
and become more territorial even to their own species. Colonies like to relocate to sites that have
hallow cavities with narrow openings.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
~ 63 ~
Tetramorium caespitum &
Tetramorium sp. E
Common name(s): Pavement Ants
Difficulty Level: Easy
Queen: Monogynous, fully claustral
Nuptial Flight: May, June, July. Flights occur from 4-7 AM but the dealates can be found
throughout the day (North America)
Habitat: Found nesting in nearly all habitats in America to Japan, North Africa to North Europe
including British Isles. Notorious for nesting among the urban setting, particularly around and
under sidewalks, roads, rocks, and pavement.
Ideal nest moisture level: 20-40% moist
Diet: insectivorous, honey water/sugar water, granivorous
Nest Temperature: 20-27 degrees C
Outworld Temperature: 20-30 degrees C
Notes: Easy and interesting species to keep for ant keepers of all levels.
Photos: queen worker male
Video: colony
~ 64 ~
Glossary
A
abdomen – includes the propodeum, petiole, and the gaster on an ant’s body [See
also propodeum, petiole, and gaster]
Acheta domestica – scientific name of the species of cricket commonly used in
the pet trade as a feeder insect. They are commonly fed by ant keepers to ants.
acrobat ant – ant belonging to the genus Crematogaster notorious for their heart
shaped gasters, which bend over their heads and to the sides of their bodies
when shooting formic acid for defense and attacking.
Adventures Among Ants – best-selling book on ants by highly acclaimed National
Geographic writer and photographer Mark Moffet. AntsCanada interviewed Mark
Moffet on The Amazing Ants of AntsCanada YouTube channel regarding his book,
experiences, career, and general thoughts.
alate – a reproductive male or female ant. They are born with wings. During
nuptial flight they take to the air and mate. Males die shortly after mating, and
females shed their wings becoming dealates and begin searching for a suitable
location to found her colony as the queen.
allele – one of two or more forms of the DNA sequence of a particular gene.
alitrunk – name given to the mesosoma or the middle part of the body, or tagma,
in ants. It bears the legs and in alates, the wings. In Apocrita Hymenoptera
(wasps, bees and ants), it consists of the three thoracic segments and the first
abdominal segment (the propodeum). [See mesosoma]
Amazing Ants of AntsCanada – The popular YouTube Channel
[Youtube.com/AntsCanada] created on July 14th, 2009 which eventually gave
rise to AntsCanada in 2010. It is currently the highest subscribed ant-dedicated
channel on the net, and has acquired international praise and viewership for its
simplistic entertainment and education value. It is hosted by the President, CoFounder/Owner, and Creative Director of AntsCanada and holds frequent
contests, draws, and interactive videos for its subscribers.
ant farm – the common name for a formicarium. The first commercially-sold
formicarium was introduced around 1929 and patented in 1931 by Frank Austin,
an inventor and professor at the Thayer School of Engineering at Dartmouth
College. Austin included painted or wooden scenes of palaces, farms, and other
settings above the ground level, for a whimsical look. The creator of the
company Uncle Milton Industries, Inc. took this concept and created the popular
plastic ant farms incorporating the farm setting within it, which became a
popular novelty product over many decades. Uncle Milton Industries,
Inc. currently owns the rights to the brand name “Ant Farm”, and has since sold
millions of ant farms worldwide. These ant farm educational toys have yet to be
accepted in the world of serious pet ant keeping as suitable, healthy, long-term
homes for ant colonies [See also ant farm and Uncle Milton Industries, Inc.].
ant love – colloquial term coined by AntsCanada describing myrmecophilia, i.e. the
love of ants.
~ 65 ~
ant woodlouse – a tiny blind, eyeless white crustacean that lives in ant nests and
feeds on ant droppings and fungus. Its scientific name is Platyarthrus
hoffmannseggi and is also known as a ‘white woodlouse’. They are only found in
ant nests and rarely come above ground.
antenna (pl. antennae) – paired appendages used for sensing in arthropods
anterior – situated before or at the front of
AntsCanada – The commonly known nickname of the President/CoFounder/Owner/Creative Director of AntsCanada, Mikey Bustos, and/or
of AntsCanada and team that runs it
AntsCanada Ants Store (AntsCanada.com) – You’re here! We are the world’s
#1 leading innovators of pro ant keeping equipment, providing quality pet ant
keeping products to ant lovers all over the world. Our clients also include
producers of The Discovery Channel, schools/educational institutes, and
museums. We also provide ant keepers with up-to-date information on caring
for ants, ant biology, ecology, and promote bioliteracy and conservation. See
the ABOUT US section of this website for more info. The store is a division
of Bustos Entertainment Inc.
Antstore – a German-based online ant keeping store [Antstore.net] which sells a
variety of standard formicaria and ant keeping products, as well as live ant
colonies to European countries. It also hosts an online ant-related forum for ant
keepers of various European languages, including English.
Antweb – an online [Antweb.org] catalogue of the world’s ant species organized
regionally, and includes information, distribution data, and close-up photographs
of preserved specimens. It is hosted by The California Academy of Sciences and
is run by curator and biologist Dr. Brian Fisher. Antweb is based in San
Francisco, California and is funded from private donations and from grants from
the National Science Foundation.
Antworks – a formicarial product manufactured by Uncle Milton Industries, Inc.
which consists of an upright plastic enclosure containing a gel medium which
acts as a venue for ants to dig tunnels and also nourishes worker ants for a
short term. They are also known as gelfarms. The formula for the gel is derived
from a NASA experiment and contains electrolytes for workers to stay alive.
These ant farms like those of other ant products released by Uncle Milton
Industries allow for mail-in ants (usually a Pogonomyrmex or Messor species)
which are sent to the purchaser (just workers and no queen), upon receipt of
the coupon enclosed with the ant farm. These gelfarms are for observing worker
ants and their effectiveness in serious ant propagation is limited. Uncle Milton
ant products have yet to be accepted by the serious ant keeping community as a
proper home for the healthy, long term rearing of ant colonies. [See
also gelfarm and Uncle Milton Industries, Inc.]
aphidicole – an animal that lives among aggregations of aphids
aphidicolous – describes an animal that lives among aggregations of aphids
aphids – any of numerous tiny soft-bodied insects of the family Aphididae of
worldwide distribution, that suck the sap from the stems and leaves of various
plants, some developing wings when overcrowding occurs. Many species of ants
farm aphids for the sweet secretions they excrete called honeydew.
Apocrita – the suborder of insects in the taxonomic order Hymenoptera that
includes wasps, bees and ants, and consists of many families. This suborder
~ 66 ~
includes the most advanced Hymenopterans and is distinguished from the
Symphyta (another suborder within Hymenoptera) by the narrow “waist”
(petiole) formed between the first two segments of the actual abdomen.
aposematism – most commonly known in the context of warning colouration,
describes a family of anti-predator adaptations where a warning signal is
associated with the unprofitability of a prey item to potential predators. The
word originates from apo- meaning ‘away’ and sematic meaning ‘sign/meaning’.
army ant – common name for over 200 ant species, in different lineages, due to
their aggressive predatory foraging groups, known as “raids”, in which huge
numbers of ants forage simultaneously over a certain area, attacking prey en
masse. They are nomadic, i.e. do not construct permanent nests and move
almost incessantly over the time it exists. It is also known as the legionary ant
or “Marabunta”. Examples of army ants include those belonging to the
genera Eciton in South America and Dorylus in Africa.
arthropod – an invertebrate animal having an exoskeleton (external skeleton), a
segmented body, and jointed appendages. Arthropods are members of the
phylum Arthropoda (from Greek arthron meaning “joint”, and podos meaning
“foot”, which together mean “jointed feet”), and include the insects, arachnids,
crustaceans, and others.
Arthropoda – Phylum of arthropods, which include insects, arachnids, crustaceans,
and others. [See also arthropod]
autoclaved aerated cement (AAC) – a porous, cement material which is water
absorbent and is often used to create formicaria, by way of carving tunnels and
chambers into the cement. AAC and similar material, is also known under other
names such as Ytong and hebel brick.
autotroph – any organism capable of self-nourishment by using inorganic
materials as a source of nutrients and using photosynthesis or chemosynthesis
as a source of energy, as most plants and certain bacteria and protists.
B
basin – also referred to as an outworld, it is an enclosure separate from the main
nest area which is designed to create a primary area for a captive ant colony for
foraging and hunting. It provides the ants with an outer world or environment
outside of the main nest where workers forage for food. It is usually connected
to a formicarium through tubing or other means and may or may not be
completely sealed. [See also outworld]
BIFA – Black Imported Fire Ant, Solenopsis richteri
biologist – someone who studies the science of life or living matter in all its forms
and phenomena, esp. with reference to origin, growth, reproduction, structure,
and behavior.
biology – the science of life or living matter in all its forms and phenomena, esp.
with reference to origin, growth, reproduction, structure, and behavior.
bivouac – in ants, it is an encampment made from improvised shelters, as seen in
ants whose colonies are nomadic.
black ant – common name given to several dark-coloured ant species
including Lasius niger and several other black species belonging to the
genus Formica
~ 67 ~
bradymetabolism – refers to the lowered metabolic speed of an organism during
a resting period, e.g. during hibernation or estivation.
brood – the young of an animal or a family of young, especially the young (as of a
bird or insect) hatched or cared for at one time. In ants, it includes a colony’s
eggs, larvae, and pupae.
brood boosting – a strategy used by ant keepers in which pupae (and sometimes
eggs and larvae) are obtained from a mature colony (usually in the wild) and
given to a queen in the founding stage of her colony in captivity. It is thought to
increase the chances of captive colony success, but it involves the risk of
introducing disease between colonies and it sometimes is unsuccessful at
helping queens along, resulting in cannibalism or death of the pupae. Brood
boosting is often carried out for queens that have trouble founding their first set
of workers, but is also often used to have a fledging colony grow much quicker.
Brood boosting is done using young from the same species as the queen/colony
being boosted, or at least within the same genus.
C
callow ant – a newly eclosed worker, i.e. a worker that has just emerged from the
pupal stage into adulthood [See also eclose]
camouflage – concealment by some means that alters or obscures the
appearance, in insects by way of exoskeleton markings, body shapes, and
movements
carnivore – animal which eats meat or invertebrates
carpenter ants – common name for a number of species of ants that create nests
in wood, belonging to the genus Camponotus. They are often regarded as
domestic pests for this reason. These ants do not eat the wood like termites, but
rather excavate by tearing away small pieces of wood fibre. They are a relatively
larger species of ant and polymorphic.
caste – a specialized level in a colony of social insects, such as ants, in which the
members (such as the queen, majors, media, and minors) carry out a specific
function.
cf. – abbreviation of the Latin “confer” meaning “compare to”. This is used to refer
a specimen to a known species even though it may not be of that species. It is
most often used when an identification is not yet confirmed.
chitin – a main component in the exoskeleton of arthropods. Its chemical formula
is (C8H13O5N)n and it is a long-chain polymer of N-acetylglucosamine, a
derivative of glucose, and is found in many places throughout the natural world.
citronella ant – common name for a yellow-coloured ant species that generally
belong to the genera Acanthomyops or Lasius (e.g. Lasius claviger), that emit a
citronella-smelling odour. They are generally a social parasitic species [See
also social parasite]
claustral cell – the fully or partially enclosed living quarters assumed by a newly
mated queen ant, where a young colony of first-born workers (nanitics) is
reared by the queen. In fully-claustral species of ants it is a chamber (usually
underground or in wood) that is completely sealed off, and the queen never
leaves this chamber. As the colony expands, the workers pioneer and extend the
~ 68 ~
living space of the claustral cell by excavating tunnels, which eventually gives
rise to a full ant nest.
cocoon – a pupal casing made by moths, caterpillars and other insect larvae. In
ants, the cocoon is created through silk from the larva. In some species the
spinning of a cocoon is facilitated by the workers who provide the larvae debris
as a framework for the pupating larvae to spin their cocoon. Ants belonging to
the genus Formica are known to bury the mature larvae with grains of dirt until
the larvae have spun their cocoon. Not all ant species spin cocoons for pupation,
and instead have naked pupae, as seen in ants belonging to the genera
Myrmica, Pogonomyrmex, and Tetramorium, for instance.
colony – a group of the same type of animal or plant living or growing together,
esp. in large numbers; a family of ants living together in a nest or set of nests
compound eye – an arthropod eye subdivided into many individual, light-receptive
elements, each including a lens, a transmitting apparatus, and retinal cells
cork nest – a type of formicarium with pre-made tunnels and chambers carved out
of cork which absorbs water for nest hydration
cosmopolitan – in ecology, describes growing or occurring in many parts of the
world; widely distributed.
coxa (pl. coxae) – the segment that connects the leg to the thorax
crop – social stomach where food is initially stored and processed before being fed
to other members of the colony via mouth-to-mouth transfer [See
also trophallaxis]
cryptic – fitted for concealing; serving to camouflage
cuticula – the invertebrate cuticle, a multi-layered structure outside the epidermis
of many invertebrates, notably roundworms and arthropods, in which it forms an
exoskeleton. The main structural component of arthropod cuticle is chitin, a
polysaccharide composed of N-acetylglucosamine units, together with proteins,
lipids, and catecholamines.
D
dealate – reproductive females (queens) that have mated and shed their wings.
Dealates are characterized by their wing scars. When alates become dealates,
they search for a suitable location to begin founding their own colonies.
dearth – an inadequate amount, esp. of food; scarcity
decomposer – any organism in a community, such as a bacterium or fungus that
breaks down dead tissue enabling the constituents to be recycled to the
environment
dichthadiiform queen – the unique type of queen of army ants belonging to the
subfamilies Aenictinae, Ecitoninae, and Dorylinae.
dimorphism – in biology occurs when there are two phenotypes that exist in the
same population of a species, i.e. the occurrence of two clear forms or morphs.
In ants it is usually more confined to the worker cast in this way: A polymorphic
species in which the minors and majors still exist but the medias disappeared.
E.g. most Pheidole species. Some Pheidole species have a supermajor cast
alongside a major and a minor caste and are called trimorphic.
diploid – A cell or an organism having two sets of chromosomes in somatic cells. In
ants, all female ants are diploid, containing twice the number of chromosomes
~ 69 ~
of male ants. The number of chromosomes determines ant sex, therefore an
unmated queen can actually give birth to young, but because she would lack a
male’s sperm to complete the full number of chromosomes and create diploid
females, the young would all be haploid, and be males.
dirt nest – formicarium containing soil, sand, or other similar medium for digging
ditritivore – also known as detritus feeders or saprophages, are heterotrophs that
obtain nutrients by consuming detritus (decomposing organic matter). By doing
so, they contribute to decomposition and the nutrient cycles [See
also decomposer, heterotroph, and saprophagy].
Dolichoderinae – subfamily of ants with genera that use chemical warfare to their
advantage. They are either odorous or spraying venom as a projectile weapon.
They also all have one waist segment, and lack any hairs along the tip of their
gaster.
dorsal – of, pertaining to, or situated at the back, or dorsum.
dulosis – the process of stealing slave-pupae and the entire way of life that
accompanies it. When the pupae eclose in the nest they are “used” as slaves for
the upkeep of the nest, care of the larvae, nest construction, defence, etc.
Dulosis can be observed in species like Polyergus rufescens, Strongylognathus
alpinus, and Harpagoxenus sublaevis.
E
ecdysis – the moulting of the cuticula in arthropods and related groups [See
also cuticula]
eclose – the act of emerging from the pupal stage [See also pupa]
ectoparasite – a parasite that lives on or in the skin but not within the body. Ants
have a variety of known ectoparasites, most of which are mites. Infestation with
an ectoparasite is called an ectoparasitosis.
ectothermy – the process of active thermoregulation (the regulation of body
temperature) by an organism by moving to areas of varying temperatures, e.g.
a lizard basking in the sun to warm up or retreating to shade or water to cool off
endoparasite – A parasite, such as a tapeworm, that lives within another
organism. Though largely unexplored, ants do have some known endoparasites,
including a type of tachinid Strongygaster globula the maggot of which lives
inside a young Lasius queen host, stops her egg laying, and eventually exits the
queen without killing her. Here the maggot is cared for by the queen while it
pupates. The queen dies shortly after and the adult fly emerges from the cocoon
approximately 15 days after pupation, exiting the nest. In fact, AntsCanada is
one of the first to document this entire process (in a YouTube video). Infestation
with an endoparasite is called an endoparasitosis.
entomologist – someone who studies insects
entomology – the scientific study of insects
epicuticle – the waxy film that coats the bodies of ants
epinotum – former term for propodeum
ergate – a worker
ergatoid – refers to a worker-like individual that can be either a male or a female
~ 70 ~
eudulosis – the process where a social parasite colony adopts a slave colony in
total, i.e. the slave queen is killed in the process. Eudulosis can be observed
in Formica (Coptoformica) naefi with its host Formica (Serviformica) sp..
estivation – a state of dormancy achieved by organisms in most cases in response
to low food/water availability and high temperature.
exoskeleton – an external skeleton that supports and protects an animal’s body
exterior – pertaining to or connected with what is outside
extreme workerless inquiline – workerless inquiline (permanent social parasite
without workers) that has undergone severe morphological adaptations like
pupoid males, degeneration of the mouthparts and some glands, development of
some glands used for attracting host-workers. Examples of extreme workerless
inquilines include the species Anergates atratulus aka Anergates
friedlandi, Tetramorium microgyna, Tetramorium parasiticum, Pheidole
neokohli, Pheidole acutidens, and Pheidole argentina. The species of
Teleutomyrmex falls under this category but they also fall under the group of
‘social ectoparasites’. [See also inquiline, workerless inquiline, and social
ectoparasite]
F
femur – the single segment connecting the trochanter to the tibia on an insect’s
leg [See also trochanter andtibia]
flagellum (pl. flagella) – the part of the antenna beyond the elongated basal
segment, or scape. Primitively, it has 11 segments in females and 12 in males,
but in many ant genera these numbers of segments are reduced in at least the
females.
fluon – a chemical known as Polytetrafluoroethylene. In ant keeping, the liquid
form is used as a barrier keeping ants from escaping open-top outworlds. It is
sometimes referred to as PTFE or the brand name ‘insect-a-slip’.
fire ant – a variety of stinging ants with over 280 species worldwide belonging to
the genus Solenopsis. Also, another stinging species native to Europe (but
invasive in other parts of the world) Myrmica rubra is sometimes referred to as
the European fire ant.
forage – to wander in search of food or provisions
formic acid – also called methanoic acid, it is the simplest carboxylic acid. Its
formula is HCOOH or HCO2H. It is an important intermediate in chemical
synthesis and occurs naturally, most notably in bee and ant venom, used
primarily for attacking and defense. There are some species which lack the
ability to spray it, however these species usually have stingers.
formicarium (pl. formicaria) – the technical term for an enclosure that acts as a
nest for an ant colony, designed for housing ants for the purposes of observation
or study. The first commercially-sold formicarium was introduced around 1929
and patented in 1931 by Frank Austin, an inventor and professor at the Thayer
School of Engineering at Dartmouth College. Austin included painted or wooden
scenes of palaces, farms, and other settings above the ground level, for a
whimsical look. They are more commonly called ant farms [See also ant farm].
Formicidae – the taxonomic family to which ants belong
~ 71 ~
Formicinae – a subfamily of ants with genera whose members have only one waist
segment, and produce chemicals like formic acid. They lack a stinger.
founding chamber – the fully or partially enclosed living quarters assumed by a
newly mated queen ant, where a young colony of first-born workers (nanitics) is
reared by the queen. In fully-claustral species of ants it is a chamber (usually
underground or in wood) that is completely sealed off, and the queen never
leaves this chamber. As the colony expands, the workers pioneer and extend the
living space of the founding chamber by excavating tunnels, which eventually
gives rise to a full ant nest. [See also claustral cell]
fully-claustral – describes a queen who seals herself up entirely in a chamber
during the initial stages of colony founding. She fasts and lives off energy stored
in her wing muscles until her first workers arrive.
fungal grower – ant species which specialize on feeding from fungus grown in
their nest reared from organic material, e.g. pieces of plant matter as seen in
leaf-cutter ants belonging to the genera Atta and Acromyrmex. The type of
material gathered above ground to culture their fungal gardens depends on the
species. There is even a fungal grower species which cultures fungal gardens
from collected caterpillar droppings.
fungivore – an animal which eats fungus
G
gamergate – a functional queen that looks externally like a worker.
ganglion (pl. ganglia) – a mass of nerve tissue that controls various functions like
movement. In insects, it typically runs down the center of the body, which is
why many insects are still capable of movement even if they are physically split
in half or decapitated.
gaster – the metasoma or sometimes called abdomen. However, because ants
along with wasps and bees are distinguished from other insects including those
belonging to the other suborder (Symphyta) within Hymenoptera, by the narrow
“waist” (petiole) formed between the first two segments of the actual abdomen
(the first abdominal segment is fused to the thorax, and is called the
propodeum), it is general practice, when discussing the body of an ant, wasp, or
bee in a technical sense, to refer to the mesosoma and metasoma (or “gaster”)
rather than the “thorax” and “abdomen,” respectively.
gelfarm – a toy antfarm which uses a gel medium for the ants to dig and also
provides worker ants sustenance. The formula for the gel is derived from a
NASA experiment and contains electrolytes for workers to stay alive. It was
released by a company called Uncle Milton Industries, Inc.. under the product
name Antworks. The gelfarms are sold commercially worldwide as a novelty
product, but have yet to be accepted in the pro-ant keeping global community
as a long-term, healthy habitat for housing whole ant colonies. Its design caters
to keeping worker ants belonging to Pogonomyrmex or Messor (which can be
ordered in the mail from the company) alive and housed for the length of their
lifespans. [See also Antworks and Uncle Milton Industries, Inc.]
gemmae (sing. gemma) – defined by Holldobler and Wilson in The Superorganism
2009 as a pair of small, club-like thoracic appendages covered with sensory
hairs richly endowed with exocrine cells. The function of these glands is not
~ 72 ~
known, but it is likely that they secrete chemical functions inducing the
mutilation process. These glandular organs are located approximately where
wings would be in an alate queen. They are found on Diacamma ponerine ants.
In these ants, when workers eclose in a nest with an established and fertile
reproductive female (known as the gamergate), their nestmates immediately
sever the gemmae. Amputation of the gemmae evidently causes psychological
and morphological changes in the central nervous system that directs the
transition from aggressive to timid behavior. [See also gamergate]
genotype – the genetic constitution of a cell, an organism, or an individual (i.e. the
specific allele makeup of the individual) usually with reference to a specific
character under consideration.
genus (pl. genera) – a low-level taxonomic rank used in the classification of living
and fossil organisms. In a scientific name it precedes the species. Examples of
genera are Camponotus, Crematogaster, Myrmica, Lasius, and Formica.
granivore – animal that feeds on grains, nuts, and seeds
gynandromorph – an organism that contains both male and female
characteristics. The term gynandromorph, from Greek “gyne” female and
“andro” male, is mainly used in the field of Lepidopterology (butterfly/moth
study) or entomology (all insects). Gynandromorphism has been observed in ant
species like Myrmica rubra where very isolated ants appeared to have both male
and female parts.
gyne – a queen ant
H
habitat – the natural environment of an organism; place that is natural for the life
and growth of an organism
Habitat Nest – the signature nest of AntsCanada, it is an original formicarial
product pioneered, engineered, and invented by AntsCanada in 2009. The
Habitat Nest’s solid, cement-type base contains pre-excavated chambers and
tunnels. The inside of the Habitat Nests possess properties of soil, lined with a
gravel layer as well as a state-of-the-art water absorbent layer developed
by AntsCanada known as Soakstone©. This dual layer within the habitat nests
allows the colonies to be completely hydrated while allowing the ants to
customize their living space without being able to burrow away from the glass.
It is 100% mold resistant and is the most naturalistic formicarium available in
the pet trade today. In 2010, The AntsCanada Habitat Nests were used to film a
nature documentary with ants for The Discovery Channel.
hamulus (pl. hamuli) – hooks on the front side of the hind-wing between the fore
and hind wings of an adult ant alate, wasp, bee, or similar insect.
haploid – A cell or an organism having half the number of chromosomes in somatic
cells. In ants, all male ants are haploid, containing half the number of
chromosomes of females ants (i.e. workers and queens). The number of
chromosomes determines ant sex, therefore an unmated queen can actually
give birth to young, but because she would lack a male’s sperm to complete the
full number of chromosomes and create diploid females, the young would all be
haploid, and be males.
~ 73 ~
harvester ant – common name given to ant species that gather grains and seeds
(i.e. granivorous), typically belonging to genera like Pogonomyrmex and Messor
hebel brick – a porous, cement material which is water absorbent and is often
used to create formicaria, by way of carving tunnels and chambers into the
cement. Hebel brick, and similar material, is also known under other names
such as autoclaved aerated cement (AAC) and Ytong.
hemolymph – a fluid in the body cavities and tissues of invertebrates, in
arthropods functioning as blood.
heterotroph – an organism requiring organic compounds for its principal source of
food, e.g. animals and fungi
herbivore – animal which eats plants or plant matter
hibernation – a state of inactivity and metabolic depression in animals,
characterized by lower body temperature, slower breathing, and lower metabolic
rate. Hibernating animals conserve food, especially during winter when food is
short, tapping energy reserves, body fat, at a slow rate.
histogenesis – the process of growth by the remaining cells in the transforming
insect within a pupa, using the nutrients from the broken down larva that
resulted from histolysis. [See also histolysis]
histolysis – the process of excreting digestive juices while inside the pupa, to
destroy much of the larva’s body, leaving a few cells intact and providing the
nutrients needed for histogenesis [See also histogenesis]. It also is the process
where the flight-muscles of a colony-founding queen are broken down to be
converted to larval food (or food for the founding queen herself!).
holometabolism – the type of metamorphosis where the larvae differ markedly
from the adults. Insects which undergo holometabolism pass through a larval
stage, then enter an inactive state called pupa, or chrysalis, and finally emerge
as adults. Holometabolism is also known as “complete” and “complex”
metamorphosis. Ants are insects which undergo holometabolism.
honeydew – a sugary material secreted by aphids, leafhoppers, scale insects,
psyllids, and other homopterous insects, which are often relished by ants
honeypot ant – common name for ant species within five different genera most
notably Myrmecocystus known for their repletes, which are gorged with food by
workers, to the point that their abdomens swell enormously, a condition called
plerergate. Other ants then extract nourishment from them. They function
essentially as living larders.
host – In biology, a host is an organism that harbors a parasite (that is, a virus, a
bacterium, a protozoan, or a fungus), or a mutual or commensal symbiont,
typically providing nourishment, support, and/or shelter. In botany, a host plant
is one that supplies food resources and substrate for certain insects or other
fauna. In ants, it typically refers to a species whose colony is the target of social
parasitic or slave-making ants, however it can also refer to the species
inside/outside the body of which a parasite receives nourishment and shelter.
[See also social parasite and slavery]
hydric – describes a habitat or soil that is formed under conditions of saturation,
flooding, or ponding long enough during the growing season to develop
anaerobic conditions in the upper part. It is one of a triad of terms to describe
the amount of water in a habitat. The others are xeric and mesic. [See
also xeric and mesic]
~ 74 ~
hydrostone – brand name given to a plaster product very similar to plaster-ofParis but more mold resistant. Hydrostone is sometimes used to create
formicaria, however, like plaster-of-Paris, also grows mold in time.
Hymenoptera – one of the largest orders of insects, comprising the sawflies,
wasps, bees, and ants. There are over 130,000 recognised species, with many
more remaining to be described. The name refers to the heavy wings of the
insects, and is derived from the Ancient Greek humen meaning ‘membrane’
and pteron meaning ‘wing’. The hind wings are connected to the forewings by a
series of hooks called hamuli.
hyperparasite – a parasite whose host is a parasite. An example of a
hyperparasitic ant species is Lasius fuliginosus, which parasitizes the social
parasitic species Lasius umbratus, which parasitizes the host species Lasius
niger. [See also social parasite]
I
indigenous – describes having originated in and being produced, growing, or living
naturally in a particular region or environment
inferior – in anatomy, describes being lower in place or position; situated below
another
inquiline – a permanent social parasite
inquilinism – the relationship where a social parasite is dependent on a host
species for as long as the colony exists. Without the host-species’ workers, the
colony will disappear. Inquilinism can be observed in species like Polyergus
rufescens (employs dulosis.), Strongylognathus alpinus (also employs
dulosis.),Strongylognathus testaceus (no dulosis; the workers are useless; when
the host-workers die, the colony disappears.), Myrmoxenus kraussei (no dulosis;
the workers are useless; when the host-workers die, the colony
disappears.), Myrmoxenus stumperi (employs dulosis.). [See also dulosis]
insect – animals within the class Insecta [See Insecta]
insect-a-slip – brand name given to the liquid form of the chemical known as
Polytetrafluoroethylene. In ant keeping, it is used as a barrier keeping ants from
escaping open top outworlds. It is sometimes referred to as PTFE or fluon.
Insecta – a taxonomic class within the arthropods that have a chitinous
exoskeleton, a three-part body (head, thorax, and abdomen), three pairs of
jointed legs, compound eyes, and two antennae. They are among the most
diverse group of animals on the planet and include more than a million
described species and represent more than half of all known living organisms.
The number of extant species is estimated at between six and ten million, and
potentially represent over 90% of the differing metazoan life forms on Earth.
Insects may be found in nearly all environments, although only a small number
of species occur in the oceans, a habitat dominated by another arthropod group,
the crustaceans.
insectivore – animal which eats insects
instar – the stage in the development of an arthropod between any two moults.
Ants have 3 – 5 larval instar stages. The shed skin is chewed into a small pellet
and fed to the larva that shed it or to another larva.
interior – of or pertaining to that which is within
~ 75 ~
invasive – describes being not native to, and also tending to spread widely in a
habitat or environment. Invasive species often have few natural predators or
other biological controls in their new environment. Although not always
considered harmful to an environment, invasive species can become agricultural
or ecological pests and can displace native species from their habitats. Invasive
species are often introduced to an environment unintentionally. An examples of
invasive species include Solenopsis invicta (also known as RIFA or Red Imported
Fire Ants) and Linepithema humile (also known as Argentine ants).
invertebrate – an animal without a backbone. The group includes 95% of all
animal species, and include all animals except those in the chordate
subphylum Vertebrata which encompass fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and
mammals.
J
jack jumper ant – common name for the species Myrmecia pilosula; they are also
known as the hopper ant, jumper ant, or jumping jack and are a species of bull
ant native to Australia. Their characteristic jumping motion when in an agitated
state gave them their name.
jerdon’s jumping ant – common name for the species Harpegnathos saltator
K
karyotype – A characterization of the number and shapes of the chromosomes of
an ant (or any) species. Karyotype studies have revealed cryptic species in
several ant genera, including Myrmecia & Aphaenogaster. The former genus is of
interest in that karyotypes of the various species span the full range of
chromosome numbers for ants, with haploid numbers ranging from 1 to 47 (or a
total of 4-94 per cell).
kinopsis – the alarm communication or recruitment mediated by the sight of
categories of kin
L
larva (pl. larvae) – a distinct juvenile form many animals undergo before
metamorphosis into adults. Animals with indirect development such as insects,
amphibians, or cnidarians typically have a larval phase of their life cycle. Larva
is Latin for “ghost.” The larva’s appearance is generally very different from the
adult form, and a larva often has unique structures and larval organs that do not
occur in the adult form. In ants they molt three to five times before pupating.
[See also pupation]
LC50 – a standardized measure for expressing and comparing the toxicity of
gaseous chemicals and toxins, but is otherwise the same as LD50 [See LD50].
LD50 – a standardized measure for expressing and comparing the toxicity of
chemicals. The LD 50 or LC 50 is the dose that kills half (50%) of the animals
tested. LD = “lethal dose”.
~ 76 ~
leaf-cutter ant – fungal grower species which specialize on feeding from fungus
grown in their nest cultured from chewed up pieces of plant matter. Examples of
leaf-cutter ants include those belonging to the genera Atta and Acromyrmex.
[See also fungal-grower]
legionary ant – army ant [See also army ant]
M
major – a larger caste of worker ant in polymorphic ant species that is
characterized by its extra-large head and greater size. They typically specialize
in tasks requiring extra mandible muscles like defense, attacking, carrying,
manipulation of objects, and in some species the cracking open of seeds, etc.
[See also polymorphism]
mandibles – sometimes referred to as jaws, a pair of appendages near an insect’s
mouth, and the most anterior of the three pairs of oral appendages. Their
function is typically to grasp, crush, or cut the insect’s food, or to defend against
predators or rivals. Insect mandibles, which appear to be evolutionarily derived
from legs, move in the horizontal plane unlike those of vertebrates, which
appear to be derived from gill arches and move vertically.
Marabunta – South American name for army ant [See also army ant]
maxillary palp – appendages under the head
meconium – the fecal pellet excreted by a mature larva right before pupation.
Larvae only defecate once in their entire life and it is when the meconium is
expelled. This happens inside the cocoon and appears as a visible black dot on
the cocoon tip.
media – the middle-sized caste of worker ant in polymorphic ant species,
possessing characteristics of an ordinary worker ant. They are smaller than
majors but larger than minors. [See also polymorphism]
mesic – In ecology, describes a type of habitat with a moderate or well-balanced
supply of moisture. Mesic is one of a triad of terms to describe the amount of
water in a habitat. The others are xeric and hydric. [See also xeric and hydric]
mesonotum – second segment of the mesosoma
mesosoma – the middle part of the body, or tagma, of arthropods whose body is
composed of three parts, the other two being the prosoma and the metasoma.
It bears the legs, and, in the case of winged insects, the wings. In Apocrita
Hymenoptera (wasps, bees and ants), it consists of the three thoracic segments
and the first abdominal segment (the propodeum). For historical reasons, in
ants it is commonly referred to by the alternative name alitrunk.
metamorphosis – a biological process by which an animal physically develops
after birth or hatching, involving a conspicuous and relatively abrupt change in
the animal’s body structure through cell growth and differentiation. There are
two main types of metamorphosis in insects, hemimetabolism (also called
incomplete metamorphosis) and holometabolism (complete metamorphosis).
[See also holometabolism]
metanotum – the third mesonotal segment. The metanotum is visible in winged
ants, and as a narrow, transverse sclerite in many workers [See mesonotum].
metasoma – the gaster or abdomen portion of an ant, bee, or wasp. [see
also gaster]
~ 77 ~
microhabitat – small-scale localized environment of a particular organism or
population. A microhabitat is often a smaller habitat within a larger one. For
example, a fallen log inside a forest can provide microhabitat for insects that are
not found in the wider forest habitat outside such logs. A microhabitat can be
big or small depending on how much it varies.
midden – the room or rooms of an ant colony where the trash is taken
mimicry – the close external resemblance of an organism, the mimic, to some
different organism, the model, such that the mimic benefits from the mistaken
identity, as seeming to be unpalatable or harmful. One form of mimicry, where
the mimic lacks the defensive capabilities of its ‘model’, is known as Batesian
mimicry (e.g. a harmless aegeria moth which is a mimic of the stinging yellow
jacket wasp). A second form of mimicry, known as Mullerian mimicry, occurs
when two organisms share the same anti-predation defence and mimic each
other, to the benefit of both species (e.g. honeybees and yellow jacket wasps
are Mullerian mimics, both of which display the black and yellow stripes which
many predators may know to avoid). There exist a family of jumping spiders
belonging to the genus Myrmarachne which mimic ants by waving their front
legs in the air to simulate antennae. Some species also look strikingly like an
ant.
minor – the smallest caste of worker ant in polymorphic ant species. Characterized
by its tiny size, it specializes in handling and caring for the young, the queen,
and simple nest duties.
monogynous – describes a species that only sustains one queen in a single colony.
Examples of monogynous species include Pogonomyrmex
californicus and Camponotus pennsylvanicus.
monogyny – the behavioural trait of a species to sustain only one queen in a
single colony. Examples of monogynous species include Pogonomyrmex
californicus and Camponotus pennsylvanicus.
monomorphism – in biology occurs when there is only one phenotype that exist in
the same population of a species, i.e. the occurrence of one form or morph. In
ants, it describes one existing form, particularly of the worker caste. Examples
of this include species belonging to the genera Myrmica, Tetramorium,
and Formica. Holldobler and Wilson in The Superorganism describe
monomorphism as the existence in a colony of only a single worker subcaste. An
entire species can be monomorphic, as well. Examples of monomorphic ant
species include the species Pristomyrmex pugens which lacks a queen caste,
where all the members of the colony look the same and every worker is capable
of laying eggs even without mating with a male (via a process known as
‘parthenogenesis’). Species belonging to the genus Dinoponera is also an
entirely monomorphic species lacking a queen caste. Also, ants belonging to the
genera Diacamma are monomorphic as they do have a queen caste but she
looks exactly like the workers.
Myrmarachne – a genus of jumping spiders which imitate an ant by waving their
front legs in the air to simulate antennae. Some species also look strikingly like
an ant. Spiders in this genus are commonly called “ant mimicking spiders”,
although there are many other spiders that mimic ants.
myrmecochory – the process of plant seed dispersal by ants.
myrmecologist – someone who studies ants
~ 78 ~
myrmecology – the scientific study of ants
myrmecophilia – the love of ants; ‘ant love’ as coined by AntsCanada in 2009.
myrmecophobia – the irrational fear of ants
Myrmecos Blog – a popular blog [Myrmecos.net] by acclaimed biologist,
researcher and photographer Alexander Wild
Myrmicinae – a subfamily of ants with genera whose members have two waist
segments. They possess a stinger.
N
nanitics – the first set of workers raised by the queen which pioneer the fledging
ant colony. In most species they are characterized by their smaller size than
typical workers and they often do not live as long as typical workers.
necrophagy – a carnivorous feeding behaviour in which a predator consumes
corpses or carrion that were not killed to be eaten by the predator or others of
its species [See also scavenger]
nest – a place or structure in which birds, fishes, insects, reptiles, mice, etc., lay
eggs or give birth to young; a number of animals of the same species and their
young occupying a common habitat
nest cycling – the AntsCanada-recommended routine but infrequent (e.g. once a
year or once every two years) replacement of a colony’s formicarium, for the
purpose of colony hygiene
nomadic – the characteristic of tending to relocate living area. An example of
nomadic ants include ants belonging to the genus Dorylus, the colonies of which
are constantly moving and are set up in very temporary nest sites before
moving to a new location.
nomadic phase – A phase in which a colony moves almost every day from one
bivouac to another one. The queen’s gaster is contracted to protect the delicate
intersegmental membranes during the moves. No egg-laying. During this phase
there are big daily raids to collect lots of food for the developing larvae. This is
common in ants belonging to the genus Dorylus, for instance.
nuptial flight – a special time period when alates (or the reproductive males and
females who are born with wings) engage in mating. For every species it takes
place at a specific time every year. Some species fly twice a year (e.g. Spring
and Fall). The male alates die shortly after mating and female alates break off
their wings and venture off to seek a suitable location to found her colony as the
queen.
nursemaid – the smallest caste of worker in polymorphic ant species, synonymous
to the word ‘minor’, which specialize in caring for the young and queen [see
also minor and polymorphism]
O
ocellus (pl. ocelli) – the simple eye of insects and some other invertebrates,
consisting basically of light-sensitive cells
~ 79 ~
oligogyny -The living together of a very small number of queens in an ant nest.
These are spaced out throughout the nest because the queens are hostile to
each other. [See also pleometrosis]
outworld – an enclosure separate from the main nest area which is designed to
create a living area for a captive ant colony for foraging and hunting. It provides
the ants with an outer world or environment outside of the main nest where
workers forage for food. It is usually connected to a formicarium through tubing
or other means and may or may not be completely sealed. Some refer to it as
the basin [See also formicarium]
P
parthenogenesis – a form of asexual reproduction found in females, where
growth and development of embryos occurs without fertilization by a male. The
word originates from the Greek parthenos meaning “virgin” and
genesis meaning “birth”. Ants that undergo parthenogenesis include the
species Pristomyrmex pugens.
patrollers – ants that travel restlessly throughout the colony switching tasks as
needed
pavement ant – common name given to ants belonging to the genus Tetramorium
known for nesting under and around pavements and sidewalks in an urban
environment
permanent social parasite – known as an inquiline or inquiline parasite, it is a
social parasite that is dependent on a slave species for as long as the colony
exists. Without the slave-species’ workers, the colony will disappear. Inquilinism
can be observed in species like Polyergus rufescens (employs dulosis),
Strongylognathus alpinus (also employs dulosis), Strongylognathus
testaceus (no dulosis; the workers are useless; when the slave-workers die, the
colony disappears.), Myrmoxenus kraussei (no dulosis; the workers are useless;
when the slave-workers die, the colony disappears.), Myrmoxenus
stumperi (employs dulosis.). [See also dulosis and inquilinism]
petiole – the stem formed by a restricted abdominal segment which connects the
thorax with the gaster (the remaining abdominal segments often referred to as
simply ‘abdomen’) in ants and some bees and wasps.
phenotype – any observable characteristic or trait of an organism: such as its
morphology, development, biochemical or physiological properties, behavior,
and products of behavior (such as a bird’s nest). Phenotypes result from the
expression of an organism’s genes as well as the influence of environmental
factors and the interactions between the two.
pheromone – secreted or excreted chemical factor that triggers a social response
in members of the same species. Pheromones are chemicals capable of acting
outside the body of the secreting individual to impact the behavior of the
receiving individual. It is the primary mode of communication in ants and other
insects.
physogastrism (adj. physogastric) – the condition of a queen’s gaster enlarging
and becoming extremely swollen with eggs, i.e. ‘termite gaster’ [See
also termite gaster]
~ 80 ~
plaster nest – formicarium made from plaster-of-Paris. In the past it was a
common method for housing ant colonies, however the disadvantage with using
plaster-of-Paris for a nest is its propensity to grow mold. Many use hydrostone
which is similar to plaster-of-Paris but more mold resistant. Hydrostone,
however, also grows mold in time.
pleometrosis – the process of one or more queens banding together to raise a
colony specifically during the founding stage. The advantage of this is that it
increases the chance of colony success. In many pleometrotic ants, when the
first set of workers arrive the queens fight, resulting in death of all but one
queen, until one dominant queen is left. [See also oligogyny].
plerergate – a condition in repletes (i.e. living storage worker ants) where their
abdomens swell enormously [See also honeypot ant and replete]
poikilothermy – the characteristic of having a body temperature that varies with
the temperature of the surroundings. It is often referred to in laymen’s terms as
‘cold-bloodedness’. Examples of poikilothermic organisms include reptiles,
amphibians, and insects, which of course includes ants.
Ponerinae – subfamily of ants that possess an ill-defined postpetiole that connects
to the gaster with a large surface area. They also tend to be either specialized
predators and or almost completely subterranean.
polygynous – describes a species that harmoniously sustain more than one queen
in a single colony. Examples of polygynous species include Solenopsis
invicta and Camponotus vicinus.
polygyny – the trait of a species to harmoniously sustain more than one queen in
a single colony. Examples of polygynous species include Solenopsis
invicta and Camponotus vicinus.
polymorphism – in biology occurs when two or more clearly different phenotypes
exist in the same population of a species, i.e. the occurrence of more than one
form or morph. In ants, it describes the various existing forms, particularly of
the worker caste. Examples of polymorphic ant species include ants belonging to
the genera Camponotus and Pheidole which possess varying sizes and shapes of
workers that specialize in various tasks.
polyphyletic – relating to or characterized by development from more than one
ancestral type.
post-petiole – body part that is present in some ants; it is a constricted third
abdominal segment
posterior – situated behind or at the rear of
pronotum – the first segment of the mesosoma [See mesosoma]
propodeum – the first abdominal segment in wasps, bees and ants. It is fused
with the thorax to form the mesosoma. It is a single large sclerite, not
subdivided, and bears a pair of spiracles. It is strongly constricted posteriorly to
form the articulation of the petiole, and gives ants, bees, and wasps their
distinctive shape.
prosoma – a term which means the head of an insect, but also refers to the first
(anterior) major body section in arachnids and malacostracan crustaceans.
PTFE – a chemical known as Polytetrafluoroethylene. In ant keeping, the liquid
form is used as a barrier keeping ants from escaping open top outworlds. It is
sometimes referred to as fluon or the brand name ‘insect-a-slip’.
~ 81 ~
pumice nest – original formicarium pioneered, engineered, and invented
by AntsCanada in 2009 created from pumice stone, which is fashioned from
volcanic rock. It contains pre-excavated tunnels and chambers and possesses a
watering system. which keeps the entire nest humid, even though the pumice
material itself is not particularly water absorbent. It is perfectly non-reactive and
100% mold resistant.
pupa (pl. pupae) – the life stage of some insects undergoing transformation. The
pupal stage is found only in holometabolous insects, those that undergo a
complete metamorphosis, going through four life stages; embryo, larva, pupa
and imago. In ants pupae may further be enclosed in cocoons as seen in ants
belonging to the subfamily Formicinae.
pupation – the process where a larva becomes a pupa
pupate – the act of pupation where a larva becomes a pupa
Q
queen – an adult, reproducing female member of an ant colony and typically the
mother of all the other ants in that colony. The term also applies to bees, wasps,
and termites.
R
red ant – common name given to several reddish-coloured ant species including
those belonging to the genera Myrmica and Solenopsis.
repletes – designated worker ants that act as living storage vessels, and store
food in their crop, resulting in an engorged abdomen. Honeypot ants belonging
to the genus Myrmecocystus are notorious for their large repletes which hang
from the nest ceilings and provide the colony sustenance during periods of short
food supply.
RIFA – acronym for “Red Imported Fire Ant” which refers to the invasive
species Solenopsis invicta [See also invasive]
rugae – wrinkles, folds. Examples include rugae of the stomach and rugae of the
forehead.
S
saprophagy – the behaviour of feeding on dead or decaying organic matter
satellite nest – an additional established nest location separate from the main
nest
scape – the elongated basal segment of an ant’s antenna
scavenger – an animal, such as a bird or insect, that feeds on dead or decaying
matter
semi-claustral – describes a queen who does not seal herself up entirely in a
chamber during the initial stages of colony founding. The queens still lays her
eggs and rears her young in a private chamber, but also continues to forage or
hunt for food above ground throughout the process until her first workers arrive.
~ 82 ~
An example of semi-claustral ants include queens belonging
to Pogonomyrmex, Myrmica, and Myrmecia.
semi-nomadic – describes the characteristic of tending to relocate living area on a
regular basis. Examples of semi-nomadic ants include ants belonging to the
genera Myrmica and Pheidologeton which set up temporary nest sites before
moving the entire colony to a new location
slave-making species – a species that uses workers of a host slave ant species to
perform everyday tasks of the mixed colony, e.g. nest construction, caring for
the young, hunting, defense, etc. Slave species workers mature from brood,
usually pupae, gathered by the slave-making species during brood-robbing
raids.
slave species – a species whose workers are used as host for a slave-making ant
species. Slave species workers mature from brood, usually pupae, gathered by
the slave-making species during brood-robbing raids. Slave species perform
everyday tasks of the mixed colony, e.g. nest construction, caring for the young,
hunting, defense, etc.
slavery – the use of a slave species for the survival of the colony.
Soakstone™ – a material engineered and developed by AntsCanada found in
AntsCanada Habitat Nests™. It is a cement-like material which is water
absorbent, 100% mold resistant, safe for ants, and is the cutting-edge
component to all products of the AntsCanada Habitat series. [See also Habitat
Nest]
social ectoparasite – an extreme, workerless inquiline (permanent social parasite
that has undergone specific morphological changes) that are totally adapted to
be carried by the host-queens (or host-workers.). They have great difficulty
walking. Examples of social ectoparasites include the species Teleutomyrmex
schneideri and Teleutomyrmex kutteri. [See also extreme workerless inquiline]
social parasite – describes a queen who does not begin her colony on her own but
rather specializes in taking over a host colony, killing the resident queen, and
taking the initial queen’s place as the colony queen. Her biological young
eventually make up the colony as her foster workers die away. Many social
parasites have a specific host species. An example of a social parasitic ant
is Lasius claviger.
social stomach – also known as the ‘crop’ where food is initially stored and
processed before being fed to other members of the colony via mouth-to-mouth
transfer [See also trophallaxis]
soldier – the larger caste of worker in polymorphic ant species, synonymous to the
word ‘major’, which specialize in defense and duties requiring greater mandible
power [see also major and polymorphism]
sp. (pl. spp.) – abbreviation used when the actual specific scientific species name
cannot or need not be specified. The abbreviation “spp.” (plural) indicates
“several species”. These are not italicised (or underlined). For example,
“Camponotus sp.” means “an unspecified species of the genus Camponotus“,
while “Camponotus spp.” means “two or more species of the
genus Camponotus.”
species (pl. species) – one of the basic units of biological classification and a
taxonomic rank. A species is often defined as a group of organisms capable of
interbreeding and producing fertile offspring. While in many cases this definition
~ 83 ~
is adequate, more precise or differing measures are often used, such as
similarity of DNA, morphology or ecological niche. Presence of specific locally
adapted traits may further subdivide species into subspecies. In standard
biological nomenclature, in the name Camponotus noveboracensis,
“noveboracensis” is considered the species, while “Camponotus” is the genus,
although when stating the scientific name of a species, it is a rule to state both
the genus and the species and to italicize when in writing. [See also subspecies]
spermatheca – the organ where the queen stores sperm.
spiracles – openings in the body of many arthropods that allow for breathing. In
ants, they are found on the propodeum, petiole, postpetiole and gastral
segments.
ssp. (pl. sspp.) – abbreviation used to indicate an unspecified subspecies. Same as
subsp. [See also subsp.]
stationary phase – a phase in which a colony rests in a fixed bivouac. The queen’s
gaster expands so she can lay a lot of eggs in a very short period. The brood is
in the pupal stage. When the eggs hatch and the callow workers emerge, a new
nomadic phase starts. This is commonly observed in ants belonging to the genus
Dorylus, for instance.
stridulation – the production of sound in insects typically through the rapid
rubbing together of body parts, e.g. wings in crickets
subsp. (pl. subspp.) – abbreviation used to indicate an unspecified subspecies.
Same as ssp. [See also ssp.]
subspecies – (commonly abbreviated subsp. or ssp.) in biological classification, it
is either a taxonomic rank subordinate to species, or a taxonomic unit in that
rank. A subspecies cannot be recognized in isolation. In other words, a species
will either be recognized as having no subspecies at all or two or more, never
just one. The differences between subspecies are usually less distinct than the
differences between species, but more distinct than the differences between
races or breeds. The characteristics attributed to subspecies generally have
evolved as a result of geographical distribution or isolation. [See also species]
submajor – a caste of major worker ant in polymorphic ant species that is larger
than an ordinary worker but smaller than an ordinary major. They are
characterized by their large major-like heads. [See also major and
polymorphism].
superior – in anatomy, describes being higher in place or position; situated above
another
supermajor – the largest caste of worker ant in polymorphic ant species that is
larger than an ordinary major, characterized by its great size and extra-large
head. [see also major and polymorphism]
symbiosis – close and often long-term interactions between different biological
species. In ants, an example of a symbiotic relationship includes ants and ant
woodlice, a small white crustacean found in ant nests. The ants benefit from the
ant woodlice because the ant woodlice feed on ant feces and nest fungus, while
the ants provide the ant woodlice shelter and protection. This example of
symbiosis is known as mutualism, where both parties involved benefit from each
other’s existence. Commensalism is a symbiotic relationship where only one
party benefits from the other’s existence and the other party is unaffected or
isn’t significantly helped (e.g. the relationship between dung beetles and the
~ 84 ~
elephants that excrete the dung). Parasitism is a symbiotic relationship where
one party benefits from the other’s existence while the other is negatively
impacted or loses (e.g. the relationship between dog and dog fleas).
T
tarsus (pl. tarsi) – the segments connecting to the tibia on an insect’s leg. The
tarsus are usually composed of three to seven segments, and make up the end
of the leg. In ants they are the maximal five segments [See also tibia]
taxonomy – the practice and science of classification. In biology, it refers to the
scientific classification of organisms by biological type, e.g. genus or species.
Tenebrio molitor – the scientific name of the species of flour beetle whose larvae
(known as the mealworm) is a common feeder insect for pet reptiles and birds.
Many ant keepers feed them to ants.
termite gaster – a condition, coined by AntsCanada, describing a greatly bloated
gaster of a queen ant due to being filled with eggs, especially during the
founding stage. For ant keepers with a freshly caught dealate, it is a good sign
that a queen has been successfully inseminated during nuptial flight. The
technical term to describe a queen with termite gaster is ‘physogastrism’ [See
also physogastrism].
test tube portal – original product invented, manufactured, and sold
at AntsCanada which allows for the connection between two test tubes or
between a test tube and a formicarium, outworld, or flexible tubing. The product
allows for breathing due to a cotton plug.
test tube setup – housing commonly used by ant keepers to house captive
dealates (young queens) in the founding stage of colony development. It
consists of a test tube with a water portion sectioned off to the end of the test
tube by a cotton ball, and the opening plugged with another cotton ball. When
the cotton molds or the water runs out, then the queen and colony is moved to
a new setup.
thermoregulation – the maintenance or regulation of temperature, specifically,
the maintenance of a particular temperature of the living body. Ants
thermoregulate by relocating themselves and the young to warmer areas when
they are too cold and cooler areas when they are too hot, a process known as
ectothermy [See also ectothermy].
tibia – the single segment connecting the femur to the tarsus on an insect’s leg
[See also femur and tarsus]
trachea – in invertebrates, refers to the open respiratory system composed of
spiracles, tracheae, and tracheoles that terrestrial arthropods have evolved to
transport metabolic gases to and from tissues. [See also spiracles and tracheole]
tracheole – a fine respiratory tube of the trachea of an insect [See also trachea]
trimorphic – in ants, describes a species that has a minor, major, and supermajor
caste, e.g. Pheidole species
trochanter – the single segment connecting the coxa to the femur on an insect’s
leg [See also coxa and femur]
trophallaxis – the process of exchanging food, often in a liquid form, that is stored
in the social stomach (crop), via mouth to mouth regurgitation and transfer
between members of a colony.
~ 85 ~
trophic egg – egg that is mainly produced for food
trophic level – any class of organisms that occupy the same position in a food
chain, as primary consumers, secondary consumers, tertiary consumers, etc.
U
Ultimate Ants & Myrmecology Facebook Group – the largest ant-dedicated
group on Facebook, hosted by AntsCanada and Bustos Entertainment, Inc.
Uncle Milton Industries, Inc. – a company which manufactures and distributes a
large line of toys and novelty products for housing living things. They are the
creators of “Uncle Milton’s Ant Farm”, for which ants (usually a
Pogonomyrmex or Messor species) are sent to the purchaser through the mail
(just workers and no queen), upon receipt of the coupon enclosed with the ant
farm. They also manufacture gelfarms under the product name “Antworks”.
Uncle Milton Industries, Inc. is based in Westlake Village, California, and has
sold over 20 million ant farms since 1956 and which owns the brand name “Ant
Farm”. These types of formicaria are for observing worker ants and their
effectiveness in serious ant propagation is limited. Uncle Milton ant products
have yet to be accepted by the serious ant keeping community as a proper
home for the healthy, long term rearing of ant colonies. [See
also Antworks and gelfarm]
unfertilized – in ant keeping, describes being unmated or unsuccessfully
inseminated
V
velvet ants – insects belonging to the family Mutillidae. They are in fact not ants
but are wasps whose wingless females resemble ants. Their common name
velvet ant refers to their dense hair which may be red, black, white, silver, or
gold. They are known for their extremely painful sting, facetiously said to be
strong enough to kill a cow, hence the common name cow killer or cow ant is
applied to some species. The earliest-known velvet ants are specimens from the
Dominican Republic preserved in amber some 25 to 40 million years ago.
ventral – situated on or toward the lower, abdominal plane of the body; equivalent
to the front, or anterior, in humans; of or pertaining to the venter or belly
W
weaver ants – tropical arboreal ants belonging to the genus Oecophylla which are
known to use the silk produced from their larvae to bind leaves together to
create nests that hang amongst foliage.
white woodlouse – a tiny blind, eyeless white crustacean that lives in ant nests
and feeds on ant droppings and fungus. Its scientific name is Platyarthrus
hoffmannseggi and is also known as an ant woodlouse. They are only found in
ant nests and rarely come above ground.
worker – caste of ant which are infertile daughters to the queen of a colony. They
make up the majority of the colony and may or may not specialize in specific
~ 86 ~
tasks including hunting/foraging, nest maintenance, nest construction, defence,
nursing of young, etc.
workerless inquiline – a permanent social parasite (known as an inquiline)
without workers. When all the host-workers die, the colony disappears, e.g.
observable in the species Myrmoxenus corsicus and Myrmoxenus adlerzi [See
also inquiline].
X
Xenobiosis – the relation in which colonies of one species live in the nests of
another species and move freely among the hosts, obtaining food from them by
regurgitation or other means but still keeping their brood separate
xeric – of, relating to, or growing in dry conditions. Deserts are xeric
environments. Xeric is one of a triad of terms to describe the amount of water in
a habitat. The others are mesic and hydric. [See also mesic and hydric]
xerophilic – describes flourishing in or adapted to a hot dry
environment. Cataglyphis bombycinus is among the most xerophilic of insects.
[See also xerophilous]
xerophilous – describes flourishing in or adapted to a hot dry
environment. Cataglyphis bombycinus is among the most xerophilous of insects.
[See also xerophilic]
Y
ytong – a porous, cement material which is water absorbent and is often used to
create formicaria, by way of carving tunnels and chambers into the cement.
Ytong, and similar material, is also known under other names such as
autoclaved aerated cement (AAC) and hebel brick.
Z
zoogeography – the biological study of the geographic distribution of animals,
especially the causes and effects of such distribution. Invasive ants might be a
subject of such study.
zoology – the scientific study of animals
Zoophobas morio – the scientific name of the species of darkling beetle, whose
larvae are known by the common name ‘superworm’ or ‘zophobas’. Superworms
are common in the reptile pet industry. In the search for easy to raise insects to
use as food for captive reptiles and amphibians, superworms quickly moved into
the spotlight, and have been a staple feeder insect ever since. Many ant keepers
feed superworms to their ant colonies.
~ 87 ~