110 replies to this topic

[AntaholicAnonymous]

I wanna know what people around you (friends, family and so on) think about your ant keeping hobby.

Are people interested?
Do they think it's or you're weird? ^^

I'm very surprised that not a single person I told about ant keeping thought it was weird or at least they didn't let me know.
Almost everyone was very interested and people wanna come over to see the ants and stuff.

I don't talk to everyone about ants but those who know all think it's awesome.
I guess it's also how you sell it to non hobbyists.

What's your experience?

[zantezaint]

It certainly doesn't give you points when you share it with your Tinder dates. 

[justanotheramy]

Well, there's a founder effect involved — people tend to cluster?
Everyone already knows I'm weird.

My mum likes watching my ants, and my brother wants his own. They both seem somewhat surprised by this.
When I post pics on Insta friends have DM'd me asking where I got the ants, if they're hard to keep, what's involved in a basic setup etc.

Some of my friends for in-person conversation purposes will avoid talking about ants because… well, there's nothing quite like a 42 year old Aspie with a fresh enthusiasm.
Others will deliberately raise the topic of ants because… well, there's nothing quite like a 42 year old Aspie with a fresh enthusiasm. lol.

[justanotheramy]

It certainly doesn't give you points when you share it with your Tinder dates. 

You should put it on your profile and weed out the duds before the date.

Although — drone, willing to die trying — is probably a bit much.
 

[AntaholicAnonymous]

I tend to warm people up to the topic first.

Let's say I wanna break the news to a group of people I'd start of with a picture of army ants building a bridge of their bodies to get to a wasp nest.

That tends to get everyone's attention.
Then I'll continue with trapjaw ants and weaver ants. By then you'll have people talking about how interesting ants are and that's when I talk about my ants and what species I have.

It's easier to get acceptance when everyone already agrees on how awesome ants are you just have to remind em before you break the news

[Ferox_Formicae]

No one cares... 

[NickAnter]

No one cares... 

Pretty much the same for me. Though, I was able to get a friend to take picture of Pogonomyrmex at Joshua Tree, and another one of my friends, who seems more interested in nature, was interested in the colony founding stage. Other than them though, everyone thinks I am weird, or just doesn't care at all.

Edited by NickAnter, March 6 2020 - 6:31 AM.

[Thunder_Birds]

I wanna know what people around you (friends, family and so on) think about your ant keeping hobby.

Are people interested?
Do they think it's or you're weird? ^^

I'm very surprised that not a single person I told about ant keeping thought it was weird or at least they didn't let me know.
Almost everyone was very interested and people wanna come over to see the ants and stuff.

I don't talk to everyone about ants but those who know all think it's awesome.
I guess it's also how you sell it to non hobbyists.

What's your experience?

I can agree. Most people think it is awesome, or interesting, especially boys, friends, or family. But not girls, they think it is weird

[zantezaint]

I'm gonna be frank. My sis laughs at me, so I can't imagine what the world would think. Imagine yourself going on Jimmy Kimmel's segment of "Mean Tweets" to see how judgemental people are. In the end though, it's hard to change what you are into, and yes, trust me, the majority of people will think you have a strange hobby, so don't be shocked if people start looking the other way. It's just the way the world works.

[Thunder_Birds]

I'm gonna be frank. My sis laughs at me, so I can't imagine what the world would think. Imagine yourself going on Jimmy Kimmel's segment of "Mean Tweets" to see how judgemental people are. In the end though, it's hard to change what you are into, and yes, trust me, the majority of people will think you have a strange hobby, so don't be shocked if people start looking the other way. It's just the way the world works.

Yeah

[Ants_Dakota]

well, me and AntsDakota have gotten one other person into ant-keeping(Thunder_Birds). Other than that, most people just think i am a little crazy.

[Manitobant]

People think it's weird. I once told a few of my friends about it and someone spread the message to the whole school. Now most kids think I'm crazy.

[Ferox_Formicae]

People think it's weird. I once told a few of my friends about it and someone spread the message to the whole school. Now most kids think I'm crazy.

Kids call me Ant Man, and I hate it. They freak out when I walk past them, exclaiming, "Ew! I have ants on me!" I just need to get a colony of Paraponera clavata, and put an angry worker onto anyone else who decides to say that. 

 

Yeah, I'm a psycho, what about it?

Edited by Ferox_Formicae, March 6 2020 - 9:55 AM.

[TennesseeAnts]

 

People think it's weird. I once told a few of my friends about it and someone spread the message to the whole school. Now most kids think I'm crazy.

Kids call me Ant Man, and I hate it. They freak out when I walk past them, exclaiming, "Ew! I have ants on me!" I just need to get a colony of Paraponera clavata, and put an angry worker onto anyone else who decides to say that. 

 

Yeah, I'm a psycho, what about it?

 

Naw. They deserve it if they call ants gross. 

[Manitobant]

People think it's weird. I once told a few of my friends about it and someone spread the message to the whole school. Now most kids think I'm crazy.

Kids call me Ant Man, and I hate it. They freak out when I walk past them, exclaiming, "Ew! I have ants on me!" I just need to get a colony of Paraponera clavata, and put an angry worker onto anyone else who decides to say that. 
 
Yeah, I'm a psycho, what about it?

just use solenopsis invicta, which are everywhere over there. People call me ant man too and they often joke about how I sell ants for some stupid reason.

[Thunder_Birds]

Sorry that happens to you guys

[Ferox_Formicae]

 

 

People think it's weird. I once told a few of my friends about it and someone spread the message to the whole school. Now most kids think I'm crazy.

Kids call me Ant Man, and I hate it. They freak out when I walk past them, exclaiming, "Ew! I have ants on me!" I just need to get a colony of Paraponera clavata, and put an angry worker onto anyone else who decides to say that. 
 
Yeah, I'm a psycho, what about it?

just use solenopsis invicta, which are everywhere over there. People call me ant man too and they often joke about how I sell ants for some stupid reason.

 

People congratulate me about it, although sometimes I'm nearly certain they do it because they just feel sorry for me. Sometimes I give them my card though.

[AntaholicAnonymous]

Damn this turned dark very quick. lol
I hate to hear that people are that stupid sometimes.

Also what I noticed is that people only started to really get interested when I made my natural tank wich I put a lot of effort into to making it interesting to look at. And non hobbyist wanna hear about large dangerous ants or more exotic behaviors.

I had a tank with soil and plastic plants and a big lasius colony in it before and everyone thought it was stupid.

As soon as I got the huge high effort tank with big red stinging ants everyone's all for it.

There definitely are people who don't understand the hobby at all and those who just wanna see something more impressive but that's a big motivator to keep on being creative in the presentation.

I've seen some beautiful setups from many people on here

[AntaholicAnonymous]

Let me use ants Canada as an example.

Over the years you can see him improve his setups and he keeps the most interesting species. You always catch people in the comments who say they don't really like ants and then rant about how awesome and interesting the video still was.

He improved a lot on esthetics and presentation. Look how many on here got inspired by him.
I think besides knowledge and experience these are also good skills to keep improving on and people will take it more serious.

I'd like to hear some thoughts on this

[AntsDakota]

Most people are polite about it, but probably still think it's weird.