Post by Deleted on Jan 11, 2023 6:07:07 GMT
I bought harvester ants a few months ago. I decided to put some out in the wild in a sandy area and they began building a little home and foraging around it. Awesome. These were Pogonomyrmex I believe barbatus, we have a native florida species as well but it thrives in areas ONE ant species usually doesn't which is likely how they manage to avoid getting swarmed to death. So I threw the PBs a bit of food and they laid claim to it. Now there were only maybe 30 of them. Then they get swarmed by fire ants, many get killed and I seen one or two around the sidewalk. I watched the same fate befall a native Odontomachus brunneus colony and I was fucking furious.
Both are well prepared to survive here, PBs in particular I was very encouraged by due to their aggression. I put one in the driveway and it immediately chased down a Dorymyrmex bureni worker and killed it. But fire ants are an absolute force here. I like live feeding the ants and giving them a terrarium with florida stuff so that they adapt to the florida environment, and it excites me they do well in the actual wild kind of... but competing with fire ants is not for them or any ant here.
Both are well prepared to survive here, PBs in particular I was very encouraged by due to their aggression. I put one in the driveway and it immediately chased down a Dorymyrmex bureni worker and killed it. But fire ants are an absolute force here. I like live feeding the ants and giving them a terrarium with florida stuff so that they adapt to the florida environment, and it excites me they do well in the actual wild kind of... but competing with fire ants is not for them or any ant here.
