Digging up an Atta, series of pictures

[Acromyrmexbob]

So I set up my camera to take a shot every 30 seconds and photographed this....


This is how the nest looked, immediately following a rain storm.


With the surface scraped.


Can start to see the fungal chamber


and the fungus garden


clearing debris as I go


Making the hole larger in order to get to the garden.




Removing the fungus garden with the queen on board


Into a waiting container


Then tidy up the site.

[Deansie26]

Great post!
The fungus looks like its a blue/ green colour in parts??
Is the ground soil clay based?

[Acromyrmexbob]

Yes very clay like. But mainly wet. When it rains like it did prior to this everything gets very very wet. The soil is heavy.

[Formica123]

I can't see any workers, I guess they hide inside the fungus?

[Acromyrmexbob]

The workers were inside the fungus but they also tend to be on the sides of the chamber. If you stuff a tissue into the cavity they all attack it and you can place that beside the fungus so all of the workers are caught.