The AntsCanada Ant Forum's

I know several people who are illegally selling ants, I didn't seek out anyone, but being in this community you are bound to run into some. I have witnessed someone selling from New Jersey to Alabama, Alabama to Texas, Texas to Wisconsin, Europe to US, ETC. Opinions on this? It is obviously bad, but have you ever run into the over state lines preventing you from bringing back ants from your vacation. I know someone who lives right near a border, so sometimes he will go out of state just on usual errands and will end up picking up a few ants, only to move them a few miles, and technically break the law, but the distance is so small it obviously won't effect much. (Note: I am not trying to put these people on the spot, or snitch on them or anything, but I just wanted to get your opinions on them.) (Note 2: I almost bought, but chose not to, and I personally disagree with what they are doing, and I have said I don't like it many times, but it doesn't stop em.)

Living in Europe I luckily don't have to bother much with these.

And while for the most part these laws make sense (foreign ants can do horrendous damage to ecosystems as can be seen with crazy ants and RIFA) sometimes nature itself makes them pretty obsolete (like you can't send RIFA to Texas but when you go outside there RIFA is pretty much everywhere and you can probably catch a queen right in your backyard).

AntLove5Ever wrote:I know several people who are illegally selling ants, I didn't seek out anyone, but being in this community you are bound to run into some. I have witnessed someone selling from New Jersey to Alabama, Alabama to Texas, Texas to Wisconsin, Europe to US, ETC. Opinions on this? It is obviously bad, but have you ever run into the over state lines preventing you from bringing back ants from your vacation. I know someone who lives right near a border, so sometimes he will go out of state just on usual errands and will end up picking up a few ants, only to move them a few miles, and technically break the law, but the distance is so small it obviously won't effect much. (Note: I am not trying to put these people on the spot, or snitch on them or anything, but I just wanted to get your opinions on them.) (Note 2: I almost bought, but chose not to, and I personally disagree with what they are doing, and I have said I don't like it many times, but it doesn't stop em.)

The laws are there for a reason. If you really are dying to get a species from out of state, either move there or get a permit through APHIS. Otherwise, do NOT break the law.

Their problem is weighing their own, literally childish opinions against actual educated mycologists and experienced hobbyists. Having an opinion about something doesn't change whether it is right or wrong. There are people on one side with knowledge and responsibility, then people on the other whose only concern is having a colony they can show off to their friends.

With the anti-scientific climate surrounding us nowadays, self-absorbed children are infiltrating all sorts of intellectual spaces. Like, don't worry people who have labored 4-12 years in college, I am 11 years old and can assure you that everything you've learned about ecology is false if it means I can't illegally import my misidentified colony.


If you want a unique colony, either:

Study your local ant fauna, and raise a species that has never been kept in captivity before (in the US, there's at least one species like this in every single state).

Move somewhere that you don't have to learn anything about ants in order to get any colony you want.

Batspiderfish wrote:Their problem is weighing their own, literally childish opinions against actual educated mycologists and experienced hobbyists. Having an opinion about something doesn't change whether it is right or wrong. There are people on one side with knowledge and responsibility, then people on the other whose only concern is having a colony they can show off to their friends.

With the anti-scientific climate surrounding us nowadays, self-absorbed children are infiltrating all sorts of intellectual spaces. Like, don't worry people who have labored 4-12 years in college, I am 11 years old and can assure you that everything you've learned about ecology is false if it means I can't illegally import my misidentified colony.


If you want a unique colony, either:

Study your local ant fauna, and raise a species that has never been kept in captivity before (in the US, there's at least one species like this in every single state).

Move somewhere that you don't have to learn anything about ants in order to get any colony you want.

Agreed.

Batspiderfish wrote:Their problem is weighing their own, literally childish opinions against actual educated mycologists and experienced hobbyists. Having an opinion about something doesn't change whether it is right or wrong. There are people on one side with knowledge and responsibility, then people on the other whose only concern is having a colony they can show off to their friends.

With the anti-scientific climate surrounding us nowadays, self-absorbed children are infiltrating all sorts of intellectual spaces. Like, don't worry people who have labored 4-12 years in college, I am 11 years old and can assure you that everything you've learned about ecology is false if it means I can't illegally import my misidentified colony.


If you want a unique colony, either:

Study your local ant fauna, and raise a species that has never been kept in captivity before (in the US, there's at least one species like this in every single state).

Move somewhere that you don't have to learn anything about ants in order to get any colony you want.

But there is a really big hole in what you are saying, if you find a queen on one side of a border, then walk ten feet into another, then there isn't ecological harm in that. Also, in some states there is biomes. For example there is some places with forests and swamplands, but move somewhere else in the state, and you're in a desert. Like in Texas for example. There is major ecological harm in introducing a foreign (but still in state) species into a new environment.

AntLove5Ever wrote:But there is a really big hole in what you are saying, if you find a queen on one side of a border, then walk ten feet into another, then there isn't ecological harm in that. Also, in some states there is biomes. For example there is some places with forests and swamplands, but move somewhere else in the state, and you're in a desert. Like in Texas for example. There is major ecological harm in introducing a foreign (but still in state) species into a new environment.

Solenopsis invicta came from the tropical rain forests in South America, and now it lives in the tropical forests, temperate forests, plains, and arid shrublands of North America. You are completely forgetting that Solenopsis invicta faced almost none of the same competition, here, as it did in its natural habitat, and so its maximum potential range within the species' physiological limits is completely unpredictable. This potential applies to literally every living species.

The ecological impact of introduced species is documented and studied by adults who have gone to college in order to focus on this, and the laws were developed by these people. Walking an ant ten feet across the border does not do measurable harm -- the state borders are arbitrary markers which give the laws boundaries with which to operate -- moving them across this border is still technically illegal. THANKFULLY, everything that is native ten feet away is also native in your state, so you don't need to import ants to begin with.

I don't know what this hypothetical situation is, that you need to collect ants ten feet outside of the border of your state.

Batspiderfish wrote:You are completely forgetting that Solenopsis invicta faced almost none of the same competition, here, as it did in its natural habitat, and so its maximum potential range within the species' physiological limits is completely unpredictable. This potential applies to literally every living species.

And you are completely forgetting that Solenopsis invicta faced almost no competition because the US government dropped BILLIONS of tons of pesticides from the skies in fear of a RIFA invasion - when all they truly did was to cause a massacre amongst the indigenous species which allowed S. invicta to just walk over their poisoned corpses and take their land.

If the US institutions hadn't decided to turn half their countryside into a post-apocalyptic ant wasteland (which is EXACTLY the habitat RIFA thrives in) S. invicta may have not invaded US territory to such a massive degree in the first place.

Serafine wrote:And you are completely forgetting that Solenopsis invicta faced almost no competition because the US government dropped BILLIONS of tons of pesticides from the skies in fear of a RIFA invasion - when all they truly did was to cause a massacre amongst the indigenous species which allowed S. invicta to just walk over their poisoned corpses and take their land.

If the US institutions hadn't decided to turn half their countryside into a post-apocalyptic ant wasteland (which is EXACTLY the habitat RIFA thrives in) S. invicta may have not invaded US territory to such a massive degree in the first place.

All you're implying is that human involvement can accelerate the invasion process. However, we know that Solenopsis invicta never needed our help to expand its range. They didn't have a problem before we started using mass-treatment pesticides in the 60's, and they don't have a problem after we stopped using them in the 80's. Mass pesticides were completely ineffective on S. invicta's ecological strategy, but they were never the cause of the problem.

USDA/APHIS:


Purdue 2014: