Garden & Animals · Observing & Recording
Ant Keeping
You watch a colony organise itself, not an individual
It costs very little and takes almost no space. The interest is not the individual but the colony: division of labour, carrying routes, rubbish accumulated in one chosen corner, all of it self-organised. The hard part is the beginning, since a newly mated queen has to be found and then left alone for weeks before anything happens.
First stepGet a test-tube nest, catch a newly mated queen during a nuptial flight, keep her in the dark, and wait the few weeks for her first workers.
Barriers
Cost to start
Under $50
Going deep → $300–2k
Alone or with people
On your own
Effort
Sitting
Without a teacher?
Self-taught
One session takes
Under 30 min
Where
At home
Why people take it up