An Exhibition at The Field Museum, Chicago

Basic ant farm

Hey there. Just wondering if you could give me some advice on an ant farm idea. If it's plasable or not. Here's the idea. The farm would be made of plexiglass and would be a cylinder with one side closed off, like a rocket head. There'd be an arch on one side to allow the viewer to be able to step into the center of the cylinder. I'm not sure the material to use for the inside of the nest, i was hoping a clear jell; what do you think? The dimentions would be these, six feet tall, the inner circle of glass would be two and a half feet in diameter, and the outer would be about four inches wider in diameter. Does this sound workable?

There's a few more things i'd like to ask. Would it be best to catch queens during neptual flight to start the colony? I was hoping to start it from a queen; or several. What do you think is the best way to catch the queens and feed the colony?

Is there anything you'd be espacially carful for?

Greatly appreciated,

Maggie Blount

Tags: Blount, Moscow

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Permalink Reply by Corrie Moreau on April 26, 2011 at 4:03pm

Maggie,

Glad to hear you are interested in keeping live ants and your project sounds very ambitious! Since I am not sure anyone has built an ant farm as large or to the specifications you outlined, I cannot really advise you on this. For additional information regarding building your own ant farm, see this link on AntBlog:

http://www.antweb.org/antblog/2010/04/how-to-make-an-ant-farm-john-...

In addition you may find other helpful information regarding ant farms and ant species to include in your ant farm here:

http://www.antweb.org/antblog/ask-an-ant-expert/ant-farms/

Best of luck,

Corrie Moreau