Hello from South Africa!

[BugMansLife]

Hello,
I'm an entomologist from South Africa that is keeping ants as a hobby mostly. I have been keeping ants for over 13 years now and I'm still learning a lot everyday!

Currently I have quite a few colonies, the most notable being:
Camponotus fulvopilosus
Odontomachus troglodytes
Plectroctena mandibularis
Oecophylla longinoda
Myrmecaria natalensis
Camponotus maculatus
Camponotus vestitus
Camponotus rufoglaucus
Camponotus empedocles
Camponotus cinctellus
Pheidole crassinoda
Crematogaster castenae
Tetramorium natalensis (Still in founding)

I have joined the forum to learn more and to get some help with my Oecophylla longinoda.

[SYUTEO]

Welcome! Anyway, I'm interested in how you keep Plectroctena, do they only eat milipedes or do they also eat other insects?

[SolenopsisKeeper]

Hello,
I'm an entomologist from South Africa that is keeping ants as a hobby mostly. I have been keeping ants for over 13 years now and I'm still learning a lot everyday!

Currently I have quite a few colonies, the most notable being:
Camponotus fulvopilosus
Odontomachus troglodytes
Plectroctena mandibularis
Oecophylla longinoda
Myrmecaria natalensis
Camponotus maculatus
Camponotus vestitus
Camponotus rufoglaucus
Camponotus empedocles
Camponotus cinctellus
Pheidole crassinoda
Crematogaster castenae
Tetramorium natalensis (Still in founding)

I have joined the forum to learn more and to get some help with my Oecophylla longinoda.

Finally another user who also knows Odontomachus! Most people don’t keep these, and I am interested what you feed yours. Mine only eat flies and scrambled eggs(Why eggs?).

[BugMansLife]

Welcome! Anyway, I'm interested in how you keep Plectroctena, do they only eat milipedes or do they also eat other insects?

Plectroctena is a very interesting genus to keep. They will take any food, but without millipedes they don't seem to successfully rear any brood. A founding queen needs a lot of millipedes to successfully rear her brood, older colonies still require around 50% millipedes in their diet to continue existence.

Mine is currently in a small natural soil nest with around 12-14 individuals in the colony!

[BugMansLife]

Hello,
I'm an entomologist from South Africa that is keeping ants as a hobby mostly. I have been keeping ants for over 13 years now and I'm still learning a lot everyday!

Currently I have quite a few colonies, the most notable being:
Camponotus fulvopilosus
Odontomachus troglodytes
Plectroctena mandibularis
Oecophylla longinoda
Myrmecaria natalensis
Camponotus maculatus
Camponotus vestitus
Camponotus rufoglaucus
Camponotus empedocles
Camponotus cinctellus
Pheidole crassinoda
Crematogaster castenae
Tetramorium natalensis (Still in founding)

I have joined the forum to learn more and to get some help with my Oecophylla longinoda.

Finally another user who also knows Odontomachus! Most people don’t keep these, and I am interested what you feed yours. Mine only eat flies and scrambled eggs(Why eggs?).

Odontomachus is one of the coolest ant genera to watch. You can see how thoughtful they are when they move around, forage and during hunting.

Feeding them is very easy. They require termites in their diet to thrive. Living or dead termites will do. My colony is currently over 30 workers with a lot of brood and they are just over 4 months old now. Other colonies that weren't fed termites at all struggle to reach a colony size of 10 worker in a year.

So try some termites and let me know what happens to your colonies population size.

[SolenopsisKeeper]

Hello,
I'm an entomologist from South Africa that is keeping ants as a hobby mostly. I have been keeping ants for over 13 years now and I'm still learning a lot everyday!

Currently I have quite a few colonies, the most notable being:
Camponotus fulvopilosus
Odontomachus troglodytes
Plectroctena mandibularis
Oecophylla longinoda
Myrmecaria natalensis
Camponotus maculatus
Camponotus vestitus
Camponotus rufoglaucus
Camponotus empedocles
Camponotus cinctellus
Pheidole crassinoda
Crematogaster castenae
Tetramorium natalensis (Still in founding)

I have joined the forum to learn more and to get some help with my Oecophylla longinoda.

Finally another user who also knows Odontomachus! Most people don’t keep these, and I am interested what you feed yours. Mine only eat flies and scrambled eggs(Why eggs?).

Odontomachus is one of the coolest ant genera to watch. You can see how thoughtful they are when they move around, forage and during hunting.

Feeding them is very easy. They require termites in their diet to thrive. Living or dead termites will do. My colony is currently over 30 workers with a lot of brood and they are just over 4 months old now. Other colonies that weren't fed termites at all struggle to reach a colony size of 10 worker in a year.

So try some termites and let me know what happens to your colonies population size.

I find it hard to find termites where I live… at least without pesticides.

[SolenopsisKeeper]

Finally another user who also knows Odontomachus! Most people don’t keep these, and I am interested what you feed yours. Mine only eat flies and scrambled eggs(Why eggs?).

Odontomachus is one of the coolest ant genera to watch. You can see how thoughtful they are when they move around, forage and during hunting.

Feeding them is very easy. They require termites in their diet to thrive. Living or dead termites will do. My colony is currently over 30 workers with a lot of brood and they are just over 4 months old now. Other colonies that weren't fed termites at all struggle to reach a colony size of 10 worker in a year.

So try some termites and let me know what happens to your colonies population size.

I find it hard to find termites where I live… at least without pesticides.

Mine are at 7 workers, and I caught the queen in decmeber… not even sure how… bumpy start, due to egg eating once or twice but she made it.

[BugMansLife]

Odontomachus is one of the coolest ant genera to watch. You can see how thoughtful they are when they move around, forage and during hunting.

Feeding them is very easy. They require termites in their diet to thrive. Living or dead termites will do. My colony is currently over 30 workers with a lot of brood and they are just over 4 months old now. Other colonies that weren't fed termites at all struggle to reach a colony size of 10 worker in a year.

So try some termites and let me know what happens to your colonies population size.

I find it hard to find termites where I live… at least without pesticides.

Mine are at 7 workers, and I caught the queen in decmeber… not even sure how… bumpy start, due to egg eating once or twice but she made it.

I found that they are very strongly semi claustral and like some space to go hunt for food. My previous attempts I didn't give them the right conditions in the small outworld and that caused their demise.

[SolenopsisKeeper]

I find it hard to find termites where I live… at least without pesticides.

Mine are at 7 workers, and I caught the queen in decmeber… not even sure how… bumpy start, due to egg eating once or twice but she made it.

I found that they are very strongly semi claustral and like some space to go hunt for food. My previous attempts I didn't give them the right conditions in the small outworld and that caused their demise.

My outworld is 100mx100mx110mm I think. Should be fine, right? Queen lays lots of eggs now, but they take awhile to hatch.

[BugMansLife]

Mine are at 7 workers, and I caught the queen in decmeber… not even sure how… bumpy start, due to egg eating once or twice but she made it.

I found that they are very strongly semi claustral and like some space to go hunt for food. My previous attempts I didn't give them the right conditions in the small outworld and that caused their demise.

My outworld is 100mx100mx110mm I think. Should be fine, right? Queen lays lots of eggs now, but they take awhile to hatch.

That should be good until they are around 25-30 workers. Mine is currently in an outworld that is 300mmx150mmx150mm and it is working great for them!