# Ant colony.. remove or leave?



## Corpus Callosum (Apr 7, 2007)

About 3 weeks ago I placed some Tillandsia bulbosa in my tank that were directly from Costa Rica. They all got mounted on the back wall, and as I was handling one, I witnessed a few ants coming out transporting what seemed to be white eggs into another of the T. bulbosa's. I figured to leave them be, get finer no-see-um mesh for my cover, and see what happens.

Well today I saw a few roaming the tank and decided I would feed them to see if the rest of the colony made it. I placed a mixture of yeast and apricot in the tank and by the time they found it, atleast 50-100 ants swarmed out of this tiny bulbosa confirming that the colony was still there, and possibly still have a queen laying eggs inside the tillandsia. They are about 2 mm in size max.

There are no frogs in the tank, it is a month old tank I have been stocking with plants, springtails, and isopods. Frogs will probably come in a few weeks. My question, should I leave the colony in the tank to be an initial food source for frogs with the possibility of getting decimated, or should I try to remove this Tillandsia and culture them in a seperate tank?


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## bbrock (May 20, 2004)

I would remove them for sure. That would be safer for both the frogs and the ants. If they turn out to be a good food source, it would be a shame to squander them by letting the frogs gobble them up faster than they can reproduce. If they turn out to be an aggressive predatory ant, well..... it's pretty obvious.


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## Corpus Callosum (Apr 7, 2007)

Well I think I've tracked them down to that one Tillandsia and I should be able to remove it, but if for some reason they were just living behind it or somewhere else in the cork bark, I doubt I'll be able to remove them that simply. I guess I should try to remove them then.


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## Dendrobait (May 29, 2005)

It would be interesting to send these to a taxonomist to see if they are a species from CR or not. Personally, I doubt it.


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## Corpus Callosum (Apr 7, 2007)

I'll remove them for now and get them ID'd later on.


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## Guest (Jul 16, 2007)

bbrock said:


> I would remove them for sure. That would be safer for both the frogs and the ants. If they turn out to be a good food source, it would be a shame to squander them by letting the frogs gobble them up faster than they can reproduce. If they turn out to be an aggressive predatory ant, well..... it's pretty obvious.


Diddo

I had a rogue colony in on of my Bulbophyllum mounts, and was getting worried as the mount and all was destined to go to the future tank I'm building. I sumberged the whole thing, though it didn't kill them, they decided it was not a good place to live and moved in to another mount. I repeated, and they once again moved out. Today I found them living in a potted orchid I have nearby. Which is fine with me, that one is going into any tanks. 
Anyway, point is, act fast before they decide to move into a nicer, less accessible neighborhood in your tank.


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## frogmeing (Sep 23, 2005)

*ant*

Well if they are indeed from CR then you might finally have some ants the PDF's will eat! And possibly a colony?...lucky you.


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## Corpus Callosum (Apr 7, 2007)

I've read ants are not very nutritious anyhow, so I'm not too excited about culturing them, but I've removed them and will work on them in a seperate system when I have time.


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## Grassypeak (Jun 14, 2005)

Cool. I'd definitely take it out of the tank though.


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## OneTwentySix (Nov 11, 2004)

That's pretty cool. I love ants; I've got three carpenter ant queens, a smaller black ant queen, and two allates that I found at work today. Post some photos if you ever find the queen, just make sure she survives. That's too darn cool to have, to risk losing!


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## raptorslovepuns (Jul 26, 2007)

That's so awesome, start up an ant farm instead of just killing them!


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