First post here, and decided to make it a journal post.I bought this colony from Drew over on Formiculture back in January (2016), and it started off with 10 workers and a queen. I was keeping them in the garage, but it wasn't a very good place for them (even with a heater). The temperature changed too much, and got too hot and too cold. Two workers died over a period of a few months and the colony was pretty stagnate. So I was left with 8 workers, barely any fungus and nearly no brood. Attaching a heater to my ant area helped a lot. Over a period of only a month after attaching a heater, it looked like this (back in June, but this picture is taken in July)
A vast improvement over a tiny ball of fungus and barely any activity. However, once Summer hit...the garage got too hot in the day and too cold at night. Again, the colony stagnated and the fungus slowly was dying off. It got pretty unhealthy.
So, I moved them into the closet. Always dark, and always 75-80 (very rarely going above 80, very rarely below 75). So, the temperature was far more consistent, and it seems the optimal texture for Acromyrmex versicolor.
And finally, here is what the colony looks like now.
Pictures taken yesterday. In just a couple months of being in the closet, there has been massive growth! The colony has grown insanely fast, and so has the fungus. I looked yesterday, and couldn't believe how many ants there were.Oh, and as a heads up. Usually there are a couple foraging areas on top, but I took them off for pictures. The dark soil is peat moss, which the ants really love to dig in (and make weird dome shaped mounds out of). Also, the fungus is super healthy. In some pictures it might look weird, but that is because of the flash and lighting. If I took them in the day it would work better, but the android phone I use for pictures needs the flash at night. Still should be awesome pictures!
