The AntsCanada Ant Forum's

For example, yogurt, etc

Ants cannot digest dairy products. The adult workers, however, are only able to digest liquid protein, from the hemolyph in the insects they eat. So yes, you are feeding them liquid protein.

lets assume i dont have insect blood laying around, because my freeze dried crickets dont likely have liquid blood in them, and its winter so theres not many insects to catch plus people say dont trust wild insects due to pesticides.

I'm kind of worried that my ~35-40 worker tetramorium colony in a test tube (hooked up to a hybrid nest but they haven't moved in) isnt getting protein from the cricket body part and seed bits ive put in another tube. Word on the street is drones can't chew so i assume solid food does nothing for them, which sounds unlikely since not eating solid food is pretty harsh weakness and ants have been around forever. But if they indeed cant eat my cricket parts directly which i suspect because it hasn't moved, i need a liquid form!

Easiest thing i can imagine is getting protein powder, mixing it with water and filling a test tube much like my water and sugar water test tubes, has anyone tried that or know of a reason why that wouldn't work?

Geffbro wrote:lets assume i dont have insect blood laying around, because my freeze dried crickets dont likely have liquid blood in them, and its winter so theres not many insects to catch plus people say dont trust wild insects due to pesticides.

I'm kind of worried that my ~35-40 worker tetramorium colony in a test tube (hooked up to a hybrid nest but they haven't moved in) isnt getting protein from the cricket body part and seed bits ive put in another tube. Word on the street is drones can't chew so i assume solid food does nothing for them, which sounds unlikely since not eating solid food is pretty harsh weakness and ants have been around forever. But if they indeed cant eat my cricket parts directly which i suspect because it hasn't moved, i need a liquid form!

Easiest thing i can imagine is getting protein powder, mixing it with water and filling a test tube much like my water and sugar water test tubes, has anyone tried that or know of a reason why that wouldn't work?

I just recently gave a drop of protein powder to a founding lasius colony (1q/10w/20egg) and they didn't seem to be interested about it at all but you can try also as different colonies like different food
Or you can make a smoothie from the frozen insect regardless of how gross it sounds, it might work.

Geffbro wrote:lets assume i dont have insect blood laying around, because my freeze dried crickets dont likely have liquid blood in them, and its winter so theres not many insects to catch plus people say dont trust wild insects due to pesticides.

I'm kind of worried that my ~35-40 worker tetramorium colony in a test tube (hooked up to a hybrid nest but they haven't moved in) isnt getting protein from the cricket body part and seed bits ive put in another tube. Word on the street is drones can't chew so i assume solid food does nothing for them, which sounds unlikely since not eating solid food is pretty harsh weakness and ants have been around forever. But if they indeed cant eat my cricket parts directly which i suspect because it hasn't moved, i need a liquid form!

Easiest thing i can imagine is getting protein powder, mixing it with water and filling a test tube much like my water and sugar water test tubes, has anyone tried that or know of a reason why that wouldn't work?

There are formulas for ;iquid protein. THe larvae can digest solid protein like your crickets, however.

The protein source is very important. Ants cannot digest dairy protein and most cannot digest plant protein. Frozen insects still have their hemolymph inside them, and the larvae will consume anything else of value.

smash up my crickets and mix with water, i wonder if that would dissolve correctly and if it would transfer through cotton... guess its time for science!

and currently there are no larva to my knowledge, only very tiny white eggs in a cluster, not sure of those guys can utilize solid food or not

Geffbro wrote: ↑

Sat Feb 11, 2017 12:02 pm

smash up my crickets and mix with water, i wonder if that would dissolve correctly and if it would transfer through cotton... guess its time for science!

and currently there are no larva to my knowledge, only very tiny white eggs in a cluster, not sure of those guys can utilize solid food or not

As soon as I'm able to get BCAA I will try this mixture, it is said it mimics the honeydew made by the aphids and also helps ants to get over periods without insect protein. So although it doesn't replace it but can be a backup plan.

Honeydew surrogate recipe

Ingredients:

25 ml of liquid amino acids (also known as BCAA) *
50 ml of maple syrup, honey is fine too
130 grams of glucose (also known as dextrose or grape sugar), table sugar is fine too
480 ml of water

(yields 600+ ml, you need to freeze it to prevent it from rotting. Advised to freeze in syringes and only warm one up when needed)

It's not too difficult to meet the nutritional needs of ants. Just regular insects is fine as a protein source. Wingless vinegar flies (Drosophila melanogaster) are a great and easy food source to rear. AntsCanada suggested that vinegar flies are not very nutritious, but I have found no evidence to support this. As an ant keeper of six years, they get my stamp of approval.

Batspiderfish wrote: ↑

Sat Feb 11, 2017 1:32 pm

It's not too difficult to meet the nutritional needs of ants. Just regular insects is fine as a protein source. Wingless vinegar flies (Drosophila melanogaster) are a great and easy food source to rear. AntsCanada suggested that vinegar flies are not very nutritious, but I have found no evidence to support this. As an ant keeper of six years, they get my stamp of approval.

Do you have your own colony of them? What do you feed them if so? Heard that their nutrition level depends on their diet. Plan to start a colony this summer tho when they appear naturally, my pet shop doesn't have them and don't feel like ordering them. Planning to keep them on cardboard + banana and other fruits