How to care for black crazy ants?

[Polyrhachiskeeper]

How do you care for black crazy ants? i have 4 queens, lots of brood and workers. I caught them in some wood.
What do they eat? Do they like crickets? They are in a terarium but i'm planing on putting them in test tubes. Do they more likely like dry or humid nesting conditions? I heard they like dry and relatively moist conditions. Is this true? Can they eat cat or dog food? Are they good at escaping? Do they grow fast or slow?

[SolenopsisKeeper]

How do you care for black crazy ants? i have 4 queens, lots of brood and workers. I caught them in some wood.
What do they eat? Do they like crickets? They are in a terarium but i'm planing on putting them in test tubes. Do they more likely like dry or humid nesting conditions? I heard they like dry and relatively moist conditions. Is this true? Can they eat cat or dog food? Are they good at escaping? Do they grow fast or slow?

I have never kept, but they are in my area. They will eat anything, including queens of other species. They grow very fast, making more queens as they grow. For this reason colonies can live basically forever.

[Polyrhachiskeeper]

Ok thanks, i heard crazy ant colonies can live forever because the males the queen produces are geneticaly not hers, so she can produce alates and the alates can mate with the males without worrying about intercolony breeding. So there is indeed a very high chance the colony will live forever

[Polyrhachiskeeper]

I have mold outbreak! On the surface there are lots of tiny mold spots, and lots of the brood has got mold!! I gave them some honey, they ate it but after a while they seemed to ignore it, i gave some dog food and they are not interested. What to do?

[Polyrhachiskeeper]

Help!!! My ants have lots of red spots on them, they look like mites, what to do?! How to keep them alive if they have alomost no brood?

[Polyrhachiskeeper]

the spots look browinish-red, dunno what it is, how do i keep them alive . I want to give my friend a few queens so he can raise his own colony But i have little hope
The "mites" are about 1mm

[Antloverhuman]

Are the mites on their legs? If yes then probably blood sucking mites, bca have alot of possiblity of getting them but in the wild they easy deal with it as there are other beneficial mites in the soil they nest in. The best way would be to wait until all the mites are on one ant or if you cant wait, separate the workers and put them in a outworld filled with wet soil and some lemon slices.
If there are alot of mites, then your colony probably wont survive

[SolenopsisKeeper]

Are the mites on their legs? If yes then probably blood sucking mites, bca have alot of possiblity of getting them but in the wild they easy deal with it as there are other beneficial mites in the soil they nest in. The best way would be to wait until all the mites are on one ant or if you cant wait, separate the workers and put them in a outworld filled with wet soil and some lemon slices.
If there are alot of mites, then your colony probably wont survive

Actually some red mites are good. My local Camponotus all have tiny red mites that stay on the legs of ants. I kept a batch of a few workers and alates with them and no body died until after 5 or 6 months.

[Antloverhuman]

Are the mites on their legs? If yes then probably blood sucking mites, bca have alot of possiblity of getting them but in the wild they easy deal with it as there are other beneficial mites in the soil they nest in. The best way would be to wait until all the mites are on one ant or if you cant wait, separate the workers and put them in a outworld filled with wet soil and some lemon slices.
If there are alot of mites, then your colony probably wont survive

Actually some red mites are good. My local Camponotus all have tiny red mites that stay on the legs of ants. I kept a batch of a few workers and alates with them and no body died until after 5 or 6 months.

That could be the case with camponotus. As far as i have observed, bca herd the good mites and make them move where they want them to move. I have never seen a good might on a bca worker before

[Polyrhachiskeeper]

The mites are mostly on the body, on all the ants, even the queens i think, but i saw one with 1 mite on the leg and the rest on the abdomen, thorax and head. It seems they are slowed down by the mites, or maybe because i didnt give them enough food.
And they really like their home, if i leave the cap open, they dont come out. I tried re uniting the ant with mites with his family in the wild, but nothing happened i think. The just accepted him and walked into the nest. Is this bad?
Now the good news . I cuaght another queen, its Polyrhachis rastellata it think (again!?). I have another Polyrhachis rastellata, can i put them toghether? i heard they are polygynous. I think they will grow faster if i unite them, bcs my old P. rastellata has 1 worker and few brood. Polyrhachis ants seem VERY common in my area, although i dont see the workers of them, just queens. This is my third Polyrhachis i cuaght! . Polyrhachis is one of my favourite ants. I was shocked to hear that AntsCanada didnt know how to raise a Polyrhachis queen! .