Leaf Cutting Ant Forum

Hey Guys,

first post here but i will introduce myself later too But be aware that i am from Germany and maybe my english is not the best english you'll ever read here.

So i will get a small Atta cephalotes Colony later this month or next month. I allready have the Starterset for Leafcutters from the Antstore from Germany
but because these Ants will need much more space later i am into planing a better place for them. So i head over to IKEA and saw this awesome thing

http://www.ikea.com/gb/en/products/stor ... -00242278/

This thing will only be for the fungus. So i will place three 40x40x40 or 50x40x40 Cages in there. This will gave me 200-240 L for the fungus.

The Question i have is ... how can i heat this thing ? The reason why i need to get this is i can not heat up my intire room.

And when it is to hot - how would you cool this ?

And as some kind of special thing - i like to have my Setup clean so i will not go and build things myself because it looks okay but most of the time the Glue Stuff looks not rly good.

Heatcables and mats are an option i thought about but i can not put a heatmat under the fungus because this will maybe destroy it ... so

i really hope you have some good ideas here for me and i hope this is the right part of the forum to post in.

Best Wishes

Mike

Hi Mike and welcome. Nice looking unit but probably going to be a nightmare to keep the temps stable in it. Long and tall is going to be harder than short and wide unless your ambient temps are fairly reasonable. There are 2 options that work well. The first being an incubator system which is basically an insulated box with the pods/ tank inside, or the aquarium system where the water heats the air and maintains humidity around the fungus that are placed on an island in the water. Have a look at the members journals for some ideas on how this is achieved.

viewforum.php?f=13

Hey Andyj,

thanks for this answer. I checked the Builds already

The Aquarium Build is not an option for me.

My Room Temps are allways over 18 degrees celsius all the Time because of my Smart Home System.

Maybe i can add some kind of Styrodur to the Back and the Sides of this unit.

I think the problem is that the temps will be greater at the top, then at the bottom, even with insulation. You could use a small PC fan to circulate the air flow perhaps.

Oh i see what you want to tell me there ...

Thats a Problem that i did not think about. So maybe ... something else as a Rackunit there.

That saves me a lot of cash and maybe a good amount of Ant-Lifes

Your idea is probably perfectly possible but perhaps not so easy to control. Try something simple to start with so you can get used to how to maintain climate and then move onto the taller display unit.

This is my Setup for the Acromyrmex atm. And this works so well !
At Daytime and when it is to cold inside this Lamp goes on. So it heats the Stones and the Space there.

And for night there is an heatcable arround the inner cage and under the Stones and that works well as well.

It's pretty much the same as how mine works too. You already understand how it all works so give your idea try. And if it doesn't work, sell me the unit at a nice cheap price.

Haha Shipping from Germany will maybe be a bit to much for this Thing tho XD

Very warm welcome on here, great to get members from Germany! I am in Germany meeting with Martin from Antstore several times per year. Very interested in your setup for Acro. So is this the nest tank and feeding area within this inner tank or do you feed them separately. What species of Acro do you have? How do you maintain humidity in this setup?
Nice to speak with you.