Leaf Cutting Ant Forum

Hello to everyone,

I just joined the site and thought I’d introduce myself. My name is Colin and I live in London, and I'd like to start a build project in my house with the hope of housing leaf cutter ants in the future. I’d like it to be a Laboratory style setup that is completely enclosed and I'd like to house the colony in a bookcase with doors that will keep them in darkness most of the time.

I've done some basic measurements for the setup and I hope to have 9 nest boxes that are 20cm cubed housed inside the bookcase .

I have a few questions and it would be great if you could help me :

1. Will a setup this size be adequate for Acromyrmex Octospinosis?
2. I've heard the queen of Acromyrmex is quite close in size to the workers - is there a size of tubing I can use that will be sure to keep her in one of the nest boxes to make it easier to locate her?
3. Do I need to think about attaching foggers to the nest boxes in a laboratory style setup or will tiles or other absorbant material on the bottom of the nest box be enough to provide the humidity?
4. Can you recommend where to put air holes in the nest boxes?
5. Can you recommend a way of isolating parts of the nest in order to make it easier to clean out the waste when needed?

Kind Regards,

Colin

Hi Colin. Great to have another potential build thread to follow:)

I can't answer you questions sadly as I'm more of an aquarium sort of fellow but you're in the right place... loads of members with loads of experience.

Hi Colin and welcome aboard, 'fraid i'm not qualified to answer some of your questions but i'm sure some brainy folks will be along shortly that can. Check out the journal thread for ideas. Ive just finished my build which sounds similar to what your looking for perhaps

Hi Colin, welcome to the forum! This kind of setup is right up my street!
9 cubes seem excessive to me for Acromyrmex but I'm sure someone will disagree, the tubing id say 14mm ID 20mm OD would be fine! No fogger required but a medium like soil will help, I use clay balls or plaster for my ocd set ups and top with syringe about once a month if required! Hope that helps!
Sean

Hi Colin and welcome to the forum. Looking forward to seeing what you come up making your set up. There is a real great bunch of regular members on here now so you will never be short of helpful advice and ideas.
About the questions you posted some of it is personal preference but I'd agree with Sean and wouldn't go down the fogger route, Seans also had good results using the clay as a base.
Pipe wise Id use one with an inner diameter of 25-26mm so there's ample room once the colony really gets going. With cubes that size drill 10mm holes in the top of the cubes and then cover with a fine mesh. I'd cover it completely till the fungus really gets going, just sit a 2 pence on top of the holes to do this, you will see the ants trying to block them themselves.
I'd hold back on adding that many cubes, build say 3 and add one at a time and take it from there. You could always get a 2 queen Acromyrmex colony which will get that bit bigger but not crazy size.
Its not difficult to just pull apart a join in the pipe work and stick a cotton wool ball in the pipe to block the ants while you modify things as Id be extremely surprised if you didn't do a lot of tinkering as we all do .
Jamie

PS. It's not a good idea to restrict the queen to a certain chamber, Andrew who will be on shortly I'm sure has had experience of the queen being dismembered as the workers dragged her through queen excluder bars trying to move her. If you keep the set up dark most of the time you will see her from time to time.

Hi, welcome to the forum! looking forward to seeing you make your setup!
unfortunately I can't answer any of your questions as I don't have enough experience with building clinical setups!
Eloise

Colin, hi, sorry for the delay in saying hi!!
Lots of questions, lots of ideas. Sounds really exciting. Will you start a thread in the build section. This ones really for saying hello. Once you have a colony in your setup you can then open a thread in the journals section. I have lots of suggestions and ideas for you, as will everyone else so if you start a build thread I bet it will be a big one very quickly!
Andrew

Andrew is right, keeps things organized. Once you do I'll clean this up,