Homemade FormiCUPSrium! :D

[Shelmi]

Great work Which ants should live in there?

[Ants4fun]

Interesting concept. How is it hydrated?

[MadVampy]

Watch that species living in there! They like to tear at plastic so they may get out. Looks cool though!

[SweetDirtyTooth]

I think you done a good design, I am not sure if it's Ant style and would work but it might do the job. Improvements could be done though and use of different material. This looks to me ( if done slightly different) like a Leaf Cutter ant style nest.

I Wish you luck and hope it works

[antscanada]

The name is great lol.

I hope you're ready for a seriously difficult species to contain! I like that you have experimented and seem open to altering the design as you go along because that is how one becomes an experienced ant keeper.

I do foresee that you may run into hydration issues. They will get out and sting you aggressively if you open those cups to put water inside.

Watch this video if you get the chance. For S. geminata I would recommend a cement nest. https://youtu.be/5zs8RRsF9TM

Good luck! Happy to see you so enthusiastic. I feel keeping S. geminata will teach you a lot.

[larynx]

awesome name. and some great ingenuity, man. i think i would figure out how to use it as a mold for something a little more substantial. great idea though.

[MadVampy]

Thanks for the heads up MadVampy. I heard this specie is hard to keep, and I'm just a beginner lol. But no surrender for me.

I will put this to a much bigger container so just in case there's an escapee, I still have a little more guard.

Need a lot of powder I think.

No problem. They really aren't hard to keep (Solenopsis Invicta), big thing is that they are escape artists, They get aggressive very easly and very fast, they will sting the hell out of you. Other then that they are pretty simple to keep. Mikey from AntsCanada had a huge colony so they can be keep with out major issues, Thing that you should keep in mind is when building (planning) a setup is go larger then you need to. The reason I say that is because of the issues (stings and such) with having to migrate them to larger formicariums is increased. If you go big scale they will only really use what they need until they grow to the point they start using more areas.

I have found they eat most anything, I have feed them hot dogs, candy, seeds, potato chips, cooked chicken and beef, fruits (mine like watermelon and apples), so like I said they eat everything. I have read on the web that with Solenopsis "If it stands still long enough they will eat it" and from what I've seen that's true!

I have found that if I give them some digging medium they will use it to construct their nests and it keeps them busy also. I simply gave them a little of the red clay soil from this area and they have fun (maybe its me having fun watching them) building their tunnels and places to hid the Queen and the young.

Solenopsis like moist soil and will pack dirt around the moist areas (I have a little corner well set up that allows the nest to stay moist in that corner and provide humidity) and then once moist will use that to construct nesting areas with. They for sure like out worlds to forage from and also take the waste (dead ants, dead brood) into. They usually will pick a corner and make a pile there.

Right now my colony is small and I have it in a Plano box (basically a sectioned off plastic case that you would see fishing tackle in) that I removed dividers and created holes between the areas to act as tunnels , I then added an out world that,s attached to that. Over all they seem to like it. I keep it covered 90% of the time (except when I'm watching them).

[MadVampy]

Four hours of hard labor. And the eyes I got from people asking what is it for.

Was thinking about that design. If you raised the cups up to the same level as he top of the out world you could put it in a cardboard box and then mix plaster of paris and pour it so it surrounds the entire outside of the cups and the out world. Then when dry pry out the cups leaving the straws in as tunnels.

[KingAnt]

I like your ingenuity!! Keep us updated on how your ants are doing!