Into the Fire

[LasiusSapien]

Ant brooding continues. She has quite a lovely clump of fat lil larvae at this point. I gave her a little piece of candy corn for her freshly hatched workers to break down and feed to her as soon as they're mature. The outworld is ready for trial runs with a lovely hunk of moss and some damp forest soil. Now we continue waiting. She's taking her sweet time in raising her babies.

dont get used to the slow pace you'll have plenty of them soon enough once you hit that 100 or so mark the queen will kick it up a gear

[BenLWolf]

Ant brooding continues. She has quite a lovely clump of fat lil larvae at this point. I gave her a little piece of candy corn for her freshly hatched workers to break down and feed to her as soon as they're mature. The outworld is ready for trial runs with a lovely hunk of moss and some damp forest soil. Now we continue waiting. She's taking her sweet time in raising her babies.

dont get used to the slow pace you'll have plenty of them soon enough once you hit that 100 or so mark the queen will kick it up a gear

And I'm mildly terrified of that. I don't know if I can handle massive waves of millions of ants. I'd like to keep them in a standard ant farm style set up instead of giving them a terrarium to just go nuts in or giving them a giant bin with dirt. I have fire ants living right outside so if I want to watch an ant hill, I can do that myself. I'd like to keep the colony medium small so they can live in a few linked farms set atop my future tarantula terrarium.

[Hawkeye]

And how do you intend to manage the size of your colony of fiery devils?

[BenLWolf]

And how do you intend to manage the size of your colony of fiery devils?

A steady temperature below 80F to keep them from hyper expansion and a food supply heavier on carbohydrates than proteins. I'm fairly sure giving them large amounts of meat would trigger a population boom since the larvae need it quite a bit. If all else fails, population control by cold and limiting food. I'd rather NOT get to the point where I have to induce famine.

[BenLWolf]

And above all else, beyond all things.. Security to the max. Making sure EVERYTHING Is sealed, locked down, and secured so they CAN'T escape. Hell, if I have to I'll start applying super glue to my formincarium just to make sure they can't find ways to pry pieces apart or dig through.

[BenLWolf]

Today's ant check has revealed one of two things. Either those larvae have gotten EXTREMELY fat, or my first workers have formed their pupae. the queen remains angry and cautious, as is tradition for her kind. I must think of a name for my little demoness.

[Hawkeye]

Today's ant check has revealed one of two things. Either those larvae have gotten EXTREMELY fat, or my first workers have formed their pupae. the queen remains angry and cautious, as is tradition for her kind. I must think of a name for my little demoness.

I vote you name her Karen after the overprotective mother she is

[BenLWolf]

Today's ant check has revealed one of two things. Either those larvae have gotten EXTREMELY fat, or my first workers have formed their pupae. the queen remains angry and cautious, as is tradition for her kind. I must think of a name for my little demoness.

I vote you name her Karen after the overprotective mother she is

Well she IS technically anti-vax...

[BenLWolf]

Ant Report... Dear LORD the lil guys take forever to mature. I had no idea ants grew this slowly. Perhaps this wont be as big of a problem as I thought. I have decided to name my queen of infinite paranoia Karen. She continues to glare at me with each ant check, but has stopped panicked scrambling. I think the purple/red plant lights of my terarrium aren't as disturbing to her as full spectrum lighting. I still wait the hatching of my first workers then I can play the game of "How long can I keep that nanitics alive?". I hope to keep the little girls going as long as any other ant just to see if I can, though I hear they tend to be a bit delicate.

[Hawkeye]

The nanitics are only fed by the queen at first, so that's why the are basically underdeveloped workers. Once there are enough nanitics to supply a steady flow of food, then either the queen or the nanitics themselves will release a pheromone to signal it is time to shift production into a higher gear. They will then feed more food to the larvae