85 replies to this topic

[Antkeeper01]

sorry dude this happens sometimes i hope you catch some this month!

[Antkeeper014]

New entry coming tonight/tomorrow. My pilifera legacy shall live on!

[Calebhunter123]

And a new entry was never added...

[Antkeeper014]

And a new entry was never added...

Only took me 15 months! Back now, with a few updates to the colony.

[Antkeeper014]

UPDATE 11/22/23 | WE'RE SO BACK

 

I apologize for my massive pilfera hiatus as of late, but I'm back now with some updates regarding my colony at the moment. 

I also realized I never published the entry for my post last YEAR, in August, so I'll address that as well. On August 5th 2022, from 5-6pm after sporadic thunderstorms, my local Pheidole pilfera population had their flights. Seems like every year the inland populations tend to fly later in the year, typically Early August/late July. This may be biased towards my specific circumstances with an extremely small and isolated population this far north but that's the way it's been for the past 4 years. I only ended up with three queens, one of which died within a week to unknown causes.

https://imgur.com/QssMSO8

 

https://imgur.com/6r5MDi6

 

https://imgur.com/r2T4AEg

 

Cool to see them really live up to their common name, the "hairy big headed ant". Check out all that pubescence on the queens head.

The remaining two were very healthy and managed to found by early September although by this point my Junior year of high school had completely swept me off my feet. I was overwhelmed by my schedule and I got caught up in certain social ramifications that made it difficult to pursue the hobby as much as I had over previous years. I was spending a lot of time on academics, and when I wasn't doing homework or studying, I was playing hockey or going out at night. This business combined with the yearly diapause period and subsequent break from ant keeping lead to a temporary fall out around December, where I neglected proper care for many of my colonies. This lead to the death of my massive M. cf. viridium colony, but my pilfera subsided happily off of their seed pile for the months they went untouched. 

Some time in April I regained the incentive to check on my pilfera, and not only were they alive, they had some brood and a solid base of workers with a major or two. I was honestly shocked that they were still in a pretty decent state after such a long time. I immediately resumed care for them and they slowly got back to a productive state of growth. Over the summer they regained traction and eventually outgrew their test tube, and graduated to tubes in tubes for a short period of time, before I decided I wanted to make a proper nest for them.

TAR HEEL ANTS STYLE NEST

 

Last month I finally put all the ingredients together in order to make a homemade, Tar Heel ants style nest. While I won't give a full depth tutorial since there already is one somewhere in this forum, I give a brief walk through on how I made mine.

I used ultra-cal 30 to cast the nest, and white beach sand to make the nest tunnels and chambers. I ended up making a custom mold out of glass panes since my last efforts with plastic molds often led to cracked nests or nests getting stuck inside of the mold. It was easy enough since I work at a hardware store, and I was able to get all these glass scraps for free. Shoutout to Ace Hardware  . I would highly recommend making a modular nest mold akin to the one I used, as it not only made the process of getting the nest out of the mold extremely easy, but also allows for completely unobstructed access while making the chambers and tunnels out of sand, which can be very difficult in an enclosed space. I calculated everything and the raw price comes out to less $1~$2 for the ultra cal required for a nest that size (3x4 in), with the neodymium magnets and water tower only adding another dollar or so to the total. Assuming you cannot get glass for free as I can, this is merely a few more dollars. Ideally this nest should be around $5 total, plus labor cost. Buying supplies in bulk is extremely easy and allows you to custom build to your liking and to your specific needs for species and nest size, and of course, saves you a ton of money. I love how it came out, even though it certainly did take a little bit of work.

 

https://imgur.com/aoSNtk1

 

https://imgur.com/vP3EG7Y

 

https://imgur.com/HDmp6sx

 

CURRENT STATUS

 

I moved my colony into their new nest about a month ago, and since then they've really seemed to enjoy it. I got a few dishes which I connected for an outworld and I really like how shallow they are, it's a really cool perspective of an outworld that I've never really been able to see before. Also allows for great pictures. Pilfera aren't exactly escape junkies so I wasn't worried at all about the lack of depth resulting in a slightly thinner talcum barrier. They are a little small for the nest at the moment but they're occupying all the chambers to some degree, whether seed storage or brood chamber, which is relieving since I was worried they'd start using unoccupied parts of the nest for trash. I've been power feeding them for the past month or so and it's really starting to show, the queen is an absolute beast at laying eggs and the brood pile is really starting to get large. Can't wait to see how this colony progresses.

That's all I have for now, I intend to keep this journal updated to the best of my ability, but we'll see how that actually turns out. Feel free to ask me any questions below. That's all folks, thank you for reading if you made it this far, and hopefully I'll upload some videos of the colony within their new nest very soon.

EDIT: I'm washed and I've completely forgotten how to upload images directly through Imgur. If anyone knows how to let me know thanks.

Edited by Antkeeper014, November 28 2023 - 10:49 AM.

[100lols]

Look forward to the videos if they come. Beautiful nest! Love the design you went with for the chambers. I’m going to make something similar for my P. vistana.