# breeding and feeding ants



## Guest (Dec 12, 2006)

My idea is to get one of the ant farms for kids and then breed the ants to fed to my frogs. Is this a good idea? I would breed live harvester ants. In the summer i would collect ants from outside and my frogs enjoyed them more than crickets. Also, would this make my frogs poisonous?


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## Grassypeak (Jun 14, 2005)

No clue on the poison part, but you are not going to be able to breed ants from one of those ant farm company’s stock. They do not supply queens therefore there will be no breeding. This subject has been discussed before without anyone coming up with an easy way to get a colony started. Nice try though.  

Oh I see that you keep terrribilis! I don’t think I would feed them any kind of ants. Why risk allowing them to produce their toxin?


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## 41714049 (Feb 23, 2006)

I once had to keep an ant colony for biology class.

What I did was get a large bucket (12" diameter and 2' tall) and fill it 1/3 with sandy soil.

Then I had to find an ant colony... found one and started digging! Dug out several thousand workers and soldiers. You have to make sure you find at least a few females... found about 20.

Put them into the bucket with the dirt they came with and start feeding. I fed them fruit, seeds, and even crickets! 

The colony established itself within a month and grew to 3/4 the height of the bucket.

Remember if you do this make sure there is a good fitting mesh lid!


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## OneTwentySix (Nov 11, 2004)

Before you go through the effort of finding a queen an establishing a culture, first test that the frogs will eat the ants. Some frogs will not take some species of ants.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Also those ant farm kits will not contain ants that are the proper size for the dart frogs... 

I'm not entirely sure why there is so much interest in feeding out ants to the frogs as it isn't necessary and ants are a poor quality food item...

Ed


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## bbrock (May 20, 2004)

Ed said:


> Also those ant farm kits will not contain ants that are the proper size for the dart frogs...


Yeah, those harvester ants will kill a dart frog in a heartbeat. Might as well try feeding them killer bees. Every been stung by one of those dudes? I have and it ain't fun. A friend of mine witnessed a toddler who sat on a harvester ant mound. They had to rush the kid to the hospital. Luckiliy they don't send enough ants with those ant farms to be dangerous but they are pretty aggressive predators.



> I'm not entirely sure why there is so much interest in feeding out ants to the frogs as it isn't necessary and ants are a poor quality food item...
> 
> Ed


Gonna have to disagree with you here Ed which just about makes my day since this never happens. Diet studies on several pdf indicate that ants make up a dissproportianate amount of their diet - although I would caution people not to assume that all dart frogs eat mostly ants. I know what you are saying about ants being a poor quality food but it is a quality that at least some dart frogs appear to be well adapted for exploiting. And if we were able to culture the right kinds of ants.... well, let's just say I would welcome the abundant food source that is also much more interesting than a fruit fly.

But for those who think ants might give their frogs the toxins they are missing, I think you are barking up the wrong bug. There are still a lot of questions but the published papers are indicating that ants are not the source of toxins. Rather, mites and beetles look like more likely sources.


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## spydrmn12285 (Oct 24, 2006)

^ brent, with that said what ants would be best suited for darts? How easy is it to culture ants and feed them? What experiences have you had with them? I'm assuming all you need is a queen and several males and you've got food that will last a while. Can you dust them to make them nutritious to be just as good a staple as FFs?


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

Hi Brent,

Fire when ready Gridley...

snip Gonna have to disagree with you here Ed which just about makes my day since this never happens. Diet studies on several pdf indicate that ants make up a dissproportianate amount of their diet"endsnip

I'll have to look up the references but at this time the vast majority of stomach content diet analysis should be considered suspect due to a bias that is the result of the data collecting method... 

In the vast majority of these studies, the stomach contents are not collected when the frog is captured nor is the frog usually prevented from continueing digestion until later when the person returns to thier set up. This delay can be as long as hours meaning that soft bodied and small prey items have a larger chance of being degraded past the point where identification of the food item can be made for these items. This means that the items left in the stomachs tend to be those that are hard to digest or contain large amounts of easily recognized items... like ants..... or beetles.... 


snip "- although I would caution people not to assume that all dart frogs eat mostly ants. I know what you are saying about ants being a poor quality food but it is a quality that at least some dart frogs appear to be well adapted for exploiting."endsnip

This appearance could be due to the sampling bias. 

snip "And if we were able to culture the right kinds of ants.... well, let's just say I would welcome the abundant food source that is also much more interesting than a fruit fly"endsnip

While the variety may be interesting to use as an alternate food source these qualities can probably be approximated by the appropriate sized beetles... 


Ed


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## bbrock (May 20, 2004)

It has been a long time since I've read the dietary studies myself but my memory believes there was a combination of gut content analysis and direct observation of feeding habits. Yes, there may be sampling bias and there may be more recent and accurate analyses but I would be very surprised if they overturn the conclusion that ants make up a significant part of at least some species diets. In the old PBS documentary with Kyle Summers, he goes to some length to discuss pumilio's propensity for eating ants and the ecological consequences of it. He makes the statement that ants are such a poor quality food that few animals spend much time with them. Clearly most dart frogs are not opposed to eating ants when offered the proper kind. And given the extreme abundance of ants in the tropics, it isn't surprising they would make up a significant part of the diet.

When I said ants were more interesting, I was refering to their complex social behavior and tunnel building. Ants are cool enough to keep just for their own sake. I don't think I could say the same thing about ff.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

snip "It has been a long time since I've read the dietary studies myself but my memory believes there was a combination of gut content analysis and direct observation of feeding habits."endsnip

Its only my interest in the nutritional stuff that has me digging through related papers that keeps me checking these items out... 

snip " Yes, there may be sampling bias and there may be more recent and accurate analyses but I would be very surprised if they overturn the conclusion that ants make up a significant part of at least some species diets. In the old PBS documentary with Kyle Summers, he goes to some length to discuss pumilio's propensity for eating ants and the ecological consequences of it. He makes the statement that ants are such a poor quality food that few animals spend much time with them. Clearly most dart frogs are not opposed to eating ants when offered the proper kind. "endsnip

Ahh but this could also be a observational bias due to territorial issues? For example in Plethodon cinereus, the larger males tend to have the territories that contain high nutrient foods like termites and have a advantage when it comes to courting females. So while ants form a large part of the diet of these salamanders (and in particular of the diet of "lesser"males) you can easily get the wrong impression if you either collected the lesser males and collected gut contents or observed these salamanders. 

snip "And given the extreme abundance of ants in the tropics, it isn't surprising they would make up a significant part of the diet."endsnip

But if I remember correctly (although its been a few years since I read that paper), the frogs will also preferentially select other foods when they are available over the ants..... 

snip "When I said ants were more interesting, I was refering to their complex social behavior and tunnel building. Ants are cool enough to keep just for their own sake. I don't think I could say the same thing about ff."endsnip

Picture winged ffs maybe more interesting. I have often pondered setting up a ant colony for those exact reasons. I have also considered setting up a wasp nest in a tank with a tube accessing the outside to observe thier behaviors. (The wife strongly disapproves of that idea)... 

Ed


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## Guest (Dec 14, 2006)

Well thanks for all the responses guys. I am definatly not getting the harvester ants. I just wanted to add some variety to what I feed my darts. Right now I am feeding solely crickets and am not getting healthy eggs (they all mold over quickly), so I thought this may have to do with an inadequate diet. What type of nutritional supplements should I provide my darts to improve their diet? What kinds of beetles would be the appropriate size to feed them?


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## bbrock (May 20, 2004)

spydrmn12285 said:


> ^ brent, with that said what ants would be best suited for darts? How easy is it to culture ants and feed them? What experiences have you had with them? I'm assuming all you need is a queen and several males and you've got food that will last a while. Can you dust them to make them nutritious to be just as good a staple as FFs?


Ben Eiben is the dude to talk to about ants. There are some laboratory culture methods worked out for ants but I haven't found any that fit my lazy lifestyle. I've offered a number of different types of ants to pdf and found a Monomorium (very tiny little black ants) and Crematogastor (what I suppose many are calling sugar ants?) to be the most readily accpepted by pdf. Of those, the Monomorium build small colonies with multiple queens that are just below the surface during wet seasons and can be collected intact. Crematogastor can form fantastically huge colonies but hide their queens much better as I've never found a mated one.

Which leads to the basic life history of ants (any myrmecologists out there should correct any errors here because I haven't read much about ants for over 20 years). The worker ants are sterile females. Only the queen lays eggs. Typically the fertile ants start out with wings and on a warm spring day, the colony swarms. All of the winged ants fly into the air which is a mixture of queens (females) and drones (males). During the nuptial flight, they mate in the air. The drones fall to the ground and die shortly after. Their job is done. The mated queen comes to the ground and bites off her wings. Then she finds a place to prepare a nest for her first brood. She lays her first eggs and tends them herself. These become the first workers of the colony. As the colony grows, the workers take over all of the chores including feeding the queen and tending her eggs. The queen stores sperm from that one time mating for life. Most of the eggs she lays are unfertilize which produces worker ants. Some of the eggs are fertilized with the stored sperm and those become winged queens and drones which will some day fly off to form a new colony.

So are they hard to culture? Some say they aren't but I haven't been able to keep a thriving colony going. First you need to get those queens which can be really hard. It is illegal to transport queens across state lines without a permit. Then you have to set them up properly so they can tend to the eggs and grow. It probably isn't too hard for someone who can spend a little time tending the colonies every couple days. But I tend to only mess with feeder insects once a week and that is all. So far I haven't found an ant system that allows for such neglect.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

What you want to check out is the chapter on rearing ants in Journey to the Ant. 
There are some good systems in there that could potentially allow for a few days neglect. 

In any case, if you are rearing a temperate species and need to leave for more than a few days, refrigerating it maybe your best bet... 


Ed


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## bbrock (May 20, 2004)

Ed said:


> What you want to check out is the chapter on rearing ants in Journey to the Ant.
> There are some good systems in there that could potentially allow for a few days neglect.
> 
> In any case, if you are rearing a temperate species and need to leave for more than a few days, refrigerating it maybe your best bet...
> ...


Are those the same methods reprinted at the back of "Ants" by the same authors? If so, I have tried their test tube method without much luck. I knew another guy who kept several colonies going at the University using those methods.


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## Ed (Sep 19, 2004)

When I get back to work (it may take a few days) I'll try to compare the two methods. 

There is also Prchal, S. and Roche, R. What to do with a Fresh-bred Queen. Backyard BUGwatching #16, Sonoran Arthropod Studies Institute, 1995. which has some excellant information in it. 

Ed


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## Rain_Frog (Apr 27, 2004)

I could have swore that an article published stated that there was a high percentage of springtails found in the stomach content of auratus.


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## kyle1745 (Feb 15, 2004)

Fruitflies, Springtales, woodlice, flour beetle larva, termites, crickets, meal worms, and etc...

Im not sure the risk of ants is worth it with all of the above and more as food options. If a colony of some ants got established in a tank they could in time over run the frogs.


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## steelcube (Mar 17, 2004)

I'd love to get some cremato. queens... but I don't think they live up here...


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## OneTwentySix (Nov 11, 2004)

steelcube said:


> I'd love to get some cremato. queens... but I don't think they live up here...


Unfortunately, unless you have a special permit, you can't legally get ants from outside the state. Makes me envyous of the Europeans who CAN order Queens to be shipped to them.


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