Last year i met AntsCanada channel on youtube and soon got in love with antskeeping. I watched many videos, read many things, but as i haven't put my hands on work, all that theoric knowledge is growing lots of doubts now i have started my own colony.
Well, four months ago i was able to catch four queen ants on a rain day, that latter i discovered as being leafcutter ants. I placed all four in test tubes, and only one was able to trieve. After the first ten workers got born i transfered the test tube to a nest setup that i made myself (I live in Brasil and i dont found nothing to buy that wasnt too expensive).
In these four months many things happend to my colony. At the start i think i made a huge mistake by loosing the original fungus the Queen came with from her previous nest on the wild. By today i'm not certain if they are surviveing without the fungus or if i just can't see it because its too small.
Today there is about 20 workers, some big, some small, and the queen, and judging by the fact that everyday i see workers cutting leafs, i imagine they are going ok. I will post images.
For food, they eat only leafs and honey. I gave them some small insects as fruit flies, but they dont care. I dont know from what they are getting protein.
My bigest question is: the ants are putting the old leafs in one chamber of the nest. Is this garbage or a fungus garden?
and a second question: how do i mantein the humidity high enought to their confort from my setup?
a third question: they did'nt got out of the inicial test tube. Is this ok until there is water in there? A time after i made the setup i got worried if the tubes are small to the queen to transitate.
I want to thank all that read all this, and be free to give me any ideas, or to point what i am doing wrong.
This is their setup. The blue and orange chambers they are not using. The red one they use as garbage, i assume as with some leafs they place dead ants there. But i dont know if they intend to use it as a fungus garden. I keep cleaning it. They dispose some old leafs in the outworld too. The tube that conects the intenal part of the nest with the outworld is full with leafs.
For humidity, in the chembers i placed one humid cotton and a humid paper on the top with small roles on the cover.
This is their outworld. I keep it always clean. The water there i use to keep the plants longer, and some white rocks for the ants to walk on there.
Good luck with your ants!