The AntsCanada Ant Forum's

I'm a total newbie from a small town just a half hour west of Ottawa.
The closest thing to ants I've had were freshwater fish when I was much younger so this is all new to me.
Managed to catch quite a few queens so far and even have nantics so any advice would be great.

I think I have a couple camponotus species and some species with the most tiny nantics I've ever seen
I don't want to disturb them so I don't have pictures yet, paranoid I'll stress them out, I'm so nervous lol

I'm not good at feeding in the test tubes so when they get a few workers I put them in a small outworld so I hope that's not the same as moving them into a Formicarium to soon.

I'm lucky cuz I live on the Ottawa river right now, renting a room from my folks because of health issues so I have a lot of time to look for ants, take photos of ants, try and raise ants and all that. Our 2nd floor deck seems to be a magnet for a lot of new queens so I'm very lucky. We're in a slightly wooded area which is even better. I have lots of different ecosystems all right here.

Glad to meet all of you and look forward to learning more and more with everyone's help

a few of my photos
https://kerrilove.smugmug.com/2018-Ant-ident/n-Rg8Wh2/i-pgpSw7T/A
https://kerrilove.smugmug.com/2018-Ant-ident/n-Rg8Wh2/i-tgGQgBC/A

if you know the species of the 2nd one, I'd be curious to know your guesses

Beautiful pics! You should introduce your colonies to an outworld as soon as the first workers arrives. Feeding in the tube causes stress and mold outbreaks. Use a one inch section of drinking straw wedged between the exit cotton and the side of the tube to act as a cozy tunnel. Then feed them in the tube. The size of the outworld does not matter as in the wild the ants literally have the entire world.