In childhood, many of us dreamed of seeing how the anthill’s life unfolds from the inside. Out of curiosity, someone was even digging up the anthill. After all, these ants that we see on the surface make up only 10% of the total number of inhabitants of the anthill. Most of the insects are hidden from us underground. To see the ant world you can buy an ant farm.
Ant farm – what is it?
An ant farm (scientific formicarium) is a plastic or glass structure for keeping ants indoors, where you can easily observe everything that is going on in the ant family.
An ant colony is like an exotic animal. There are no special problems with their maintenance, and observing the inhabitants of the anthill is a very exciting activity. At the same time you have the opportunity to see the development of the colony from the very beginning.
Recently, formicaria for offices has been bought. Someone buys as their pet because the farm is compact and does not take up much space. Some people acquire large ant farms and put them in the hall or in the boss’s office. Many people give the ant farm in the form of an original gift. Ants are social insects, so you can watch them for hours, constantly doing something and interacting with each other.
Mostly ants are divided into hunters and gatherers. Hunters need protein foods and carbohydrates, they are predators and they fall prey to other insects. Another interesting feature of such ants is their hunting. It is very interesting to observe how the ants use their antennas to obtain pheromones. In case one of the ants finds syrup or fruit, on its way back to the anthill it makes its way through the end of its belly with pheromones, which allows other ants in its colony to quickly find their way to eat. All these interesting moments will be perfectly visible in the formaria.
Reaper ants differ from hunter ants in a number of ways. They mainly eat what they find. These are mainly plant seeds (poppy, rape, millet). They do not deny themselves protein in food. They can eat dead insects or cooked chicken. They do not hunt insects, but defend themselves against them. But these ants have a very interesting internal structure of the anthill. There are food storage rooms (stores where they keep seeds for a long time), dining rooms (where they bring seeds, soften them with moisture and eat them), caretaker rooms (in these rooms, ants look after the larvae and feed them). You can observe all the processes taking place in the anthill with your own eyes!
As a rule, ants in the same family are divided into castes: intelligence officers, working ants, nurse ants, soldiers and queen (queen). Virtually every species has intelligent ants, they make up a small percentage of the total population of the anthill. Their task is to explore unknown territories and search for new sources of food. Workers perform all the important activities: workers, build, carry food, sort warehouses, clean the anthill. The soldiers differ from the rest of the ants in their larger size, they have a large head and strong jaws. Nanny ants practically do not depart from the young, they feed the larvae and the mother herself.
The mother is the main ant in the colony. All the ants in an anthill are born from one womb, that is, they are all brothers (although all ants are female). The mother’s job is only to lay new eggs. She doesn’t even get any food herself. There are species of keel in which there may be several queens.
Each anthill and its inhabitants have its own unique smell, so even ants from the same species but from different anthills will be hostile to each other.
The children will be delighted
Children are interested in what is happening in the anthill and how ants develop. They have the opportunity to grow a large family from a small colony of 20-25 ants. In addition, the formicarium allows children to get to know nature better and to get away from harmful gadgets at least for a while. By observing ants, they learn many new things from the fascinating world of these insects that have lived on our planet for several million years.And for adults, such observation is the best way to disconnect from everyday worries for at least an hour and this allows the body to relax.
