Recommended ant species for beginners

Discussions about the care and keeping of ants

Moderator: ooper01

Post Reply
FishFingers
Posts: 9
Joined: Sat Jul 15, 2017 9:37 am

Recommended ant species for beginners

Post: # 34913Post FishFingers
Sat Apr 07, 2018 11:19 am

Hello, my fellow ant enthusiasts!
I am a beginner ant keeper, and I currently own a small colony of myrmecocystus mexicanus (i was not aware how hard these are to keep when i bought them), which I am looking to give away, and i am looking for a replacement species. I live in california, and i was wondering if myrmica rubra would be a good beginner species. I have seen quite a few sources stating that they are good for beginners to keep, but I would like to be sure of this. I’ve kind of been wanting a stinging species, and a species that accepts multiple queens.
What do you guys think?

Mortamir
Posts: 113
Joined: Sun Jun 04, 2017 12:00 pm
Location: Washington

Re: Recommended ant species for beginners

Post: # 34914Post Mortamir
Sat Apr 07, 2018 12:02 pm

Ok, uh, not sure what to tell you buddy. The one you have is good for first timers. Not sure about stinging species. If you just want a bug that has risk get a scorpion. If you want an aggressive ant almost all species are aggressive when threatened. But that can stress the colony. If you want an ant that can overpower most foods then get a camponotas that has majors. There colonies grow slow though and you need to be patient. It can be two years to get 30-40 workers easy. I would suggest you search for an active ant like Formica. Pretty fast growing and very active.
I prefer camponotas because there workers live a lot longer for most of them and I like that they have different sizes for workers.
Keeper of:
Camponotus Laevigatus
Formica sp.
Lasius Flavus
Camponotus Modoc
Polyrhacis Dives
Camponotus friedae

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 13 guests