Leaf Cutting Ant Forum

Thought you might be interested. When I have colonies that need transplanted fungus from another, healthy colony, I used to spend ages separating most of the ants out from the fungus before introducing the fungus to the recipient colony. However, over the years I have come to recognize that a strange thing happens when ants are added to a new colony along with the fungus. They very rarely fight. With Atta you need to remove majors and the largest workers. You need to ensure that there are many more workers in the recipient colony than are being transferred in on the donor fungus. In the face of overwhelming numbers the new ants do not fight, they are very submissive and they are generally integrated in to the new colony immediately. I would be interested in anyone elses views or experiences regarding this.