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ant population control

Posted: Thu Mar 30, 2017 4:46 am
by daxling12
ive heard of lowering the tempature for ants or reducing the amount of food they recieve but if a colony starts growing a bit too large would it be ill advised depending on the species to occasionally use it as a treat for another pet like frog/lizard/snake whichever would naturally hunt this ant and its feeder insect as well. of course since i know they arent nutritious it wouldn't work as a sustained diet but thought it might work as a good means of population control if the ants grow out of hand and a good treat for the other pet any other thoughts on this? or warnings ?

Re: ant population control

Posted: Thu Mar 30, 2017 7:20 pm
by jwatson16202
I'm not sure I would feed my captive colony to another pet, that seems remarkably callous.

Your best bet is to lower the temperature slightly and reduce their food intake a little as soon as the colony starts getting to the maximum manageable size for you. Both of these things will slow the development of existing brood, and lower the queen's egg laying rate.

Re: ant population control

Posted: Thu Mar 30, 2017 8:55 pm
by MadVampy
daxling12 wrote:
Thu Mar 30, 2017 4:46 am
ive heard of lowering the tempature for ants or reducing the amount of food they recieve but if a colony starts growing a bit too large would it be ill advised depending on the species to occasionally use it as a treat for another pet like frog/lizard/snake whichever would naturally hunt this ant and its feeder insect as well. of course since i know they arent nutritious it wouldn't work as a sustained diet but thought it might work as a good means of population control if the ants grow out of hand and a good treat for the other pet any other thoughts on this? or warnings ?
I really don't know how to react to this. Ok yes if you want to slow down the growth of your colony you can do that with adjustments to their food supply and or temperature of their nest's or the room they are kept in.

As far as taking and trying to reduce the size by feeding them to another pet? I kind of find that repulsive. I could use use the same example you used with other pets like cats or dogs but that would be inhumane to even suggest.

Let's make this clear about ants, they have large colonies for a couple of reasons. #1 an average ant doesn't live that long (Solenopsis only live about a month) and it can take about 2 to 3 weeks for a egg to enclose to provide a replacement worker so it's a continuing cycle to replace those that die. #2 They are large in number because they have to cover so many roles in the colony. #3 they have to at times forage a large distance to acquire food for the colony and in doing so will lose numbers in doing so. #4 Lastly with being so small ants do things in large numbers, whether it be hunting down larger prey, defending the colony against attacks, building the nest and so forth.

Not a personal attack against you but if you don't want a colony that "Might get too big" then I suggest finding a some workers and be content with a colony that will never grow. Because if you have a colony that has a Queen or Queens and is feed and kept like it should be they will grow thats for sure, it's just part of keeping ants as pets.

Re: ant population control

Posted: Sun Apr 02, 2017 11:11 am
by Martialis
merkantur wrote:
Sun Apr 02, 2017 9:51 am
If it gets too big you could always release them or put them up on the GAN project
It is irresponsible to release invasive species.
daxling12 wrote:
Thu Mar 30, 2017 4:46 am
ive heard of lowering the tempature for ants or reducing the amount of food they recieve but if a colony starts growing a bit too large would it be ill advised depending on the species to occasionally use it as a treat for another pet like frog/lizard/snake whichever would naturally hunt this ant and its feeder insect as well. of course since i know they arent nutritious it wouldn't work as a sustained diet but thought it might work as a good means of population control if the ants grow out of hand and a good treat for the other pet any other thoughts on this? or warnings ?
What species are you talking about? I agree that feeding them to other pets isn't a good idea.

Re: ant population control

Posted: Wed Apr 05, 2017 7:25 am
by Martialis
merkantur wrote:
Tue Apr 04, 2017 11:21 pm
Martialis wrote:
Sun Apr 02, 2017 11:11 am
merkantur wrote:
Sun Apr 02, 2017 9:51 am
If it gets too big you could always release them or put them up on the GAN project
It is irresponsible to release invasive species.
I don't think it's a problem if the queen was caught in the same area.
It can be. If I were to take a Solenopsis invicta queen, transport it to my house, and then release it, it would be irresponsible. Releasing a colony of them is basically the same. Why would you endanger the wildlife even more than it already is by the species?

Re: ant population control

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2018 9:36 am
by Goost1049
I haven't been doing ant keeping very long, but I think that feeding your captive ants do another animal would be the same as feeding a captive rat to a snake. Even Mikey on his YouTube channel feeds his captive roaches to his ants. Am I also to be looked down upon because I breed mealworms to feed other animals? Who is to say that an ant's life is any more valuable than a mealworm, cockroach, or rat? It is a natural food source.

Re: ant population control

Posted: Tue Jun 12, 2018 10:25 pm
by MadVampy
All things must eat, and if your taking on a pet it is your responsibility to feed them. This goes for ants, dog's, cats, snakes, lizards, so forth. It anyone has and issue with this then I suggest getting a Pet Rock, from what I hear they don't eat much.

Re: ant population control

Posted: Wed Jun 13, 2018 6:58 pm
by AntDudeUSA
About feeding ants to other pets I wouldn't do that except for one very special occasion which is a thorny dragon, that is a type of lizard that lives in the Arizona desert and its main diet is harvester ants so I could see having a thorny dragon and one or two colonies of harvester ants