Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Anyone have any ideas about feeding harvestor ants in a large (8'x8') cage with smooth solid sides. I was thinking of establishing a colony of ants in it, but so far I have not been able to dig up a queen. Should I offer them in a pan or just loose?
-----
Justyn Miller
Intense Herpetoculture
www.IntenseHerp.com (Proudly hosted by Fauna Net)

We have a bird feeder outside where we put in the standard mixture of wild bird seed. I have often seen P. rugosus "harvesting" from the feeder. You should be able to just sprinkle it on the ground. You can also offer slices of apple or watermellon at times. This helps them hydrate. They will drink from a shallow dish (or even a wet rock) as well.
Good luck with hunting down a queen.
-----
www.phrynosoma.com

So just throw the ants down in there and provide them w/ food? I have a colony going inside a 10 gallon right now, but I don't think I have a queen. I guess I'll just try to transplant it into the enclosure.

>>We have a bird feeder outside where we put in the standard mixture of wild bird seed. I have often seen P. rugosus "harvesting" from the feeder. You should be able to just sprinkle it on the ground. You can also offer slices of apple or watermellon at times. This helps them hydrate. They will drink from a shallow dish (or even a wet rock) as well.
>>Good luck with hunting down a queen.
>>-----
>>www.phrynosoma.com
-----
Justyn Miller
Intense Herpetoculture
www.IntenseHerp.com (Proudly hosted by Fauna Net)

hey Justyn,

I'm planning on trying to do the same pretty soon. my estimation is that an enclosure the size you described might be the very minimum size necessary to get a colony to produce. actually, I had envisioned almost twice that size for the space of a single colony, to start with. queens are very difficult to get to. I've dug down 4 ft. before without success. perhaps we can consult on this further to exchange plans. will this be an outdoor enclosure? in their native range? or are you transplanting?

I gathered some medicine bottles from the pharmacy yesterday and the pharmacist asked "what for?". I told him for harvester ants, and he went on about expressing his "concern as a farmer and a rancher" for me bringing them back here. I asked him "well, how 'ya doin' with those Solenopsis invicta!?"

Mick
-----
"When tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign foe."

James Madison

The Complete Works of Goerge Savile, First Marquess of Halifax, 1912.

Yeah, I do plan on building a few 8'x16' for the horned lizards, but right now all I have is my 8'x8'. I am collecting the ants from a few miles away from my place, so non-native introductions would not be a problem. I do have to work on better drainage issues though. I dug a small colony up, 3 foot across and two feet deep, no luck. Maybe next time.

>>hey Justyn,
>>
>>I'm planning on trying to do the same pretty soon. my estimation is that an enclosure the size you described might be the very minimum size necessary to get a colony to produce. actually, I had envisioned almost twice that size for the space of a single colony, to start with. queens are very difficult to get to. I've dug down 4 ft. before without success. perhaps we can consult on this further to exchange plans. will this be an outdoor enclosure? in their native range? or are you transplanting?
>>
>>I gathered some medicine bottles from the pharmacy yesterday and the pharmacist asked "what for?". I told him for harvester ants, and he went on about expressing his "concern as a farmer and a rancher" for me bringing them back here. I asked him "well, how 'ya doin' with those Solenopsis invicta!?"
>>
>>Mick
>>-----
>>"When tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign foe."
>>
>>James Madison
>>
>>
>>The Complete Works of Goerge Savile, First Marquess of Halifax, 1912.
-----
Justyn Miller
Intense Herpetoculture
www.IntenseHerp.com (Proudly hosted by Fauna Net)

oh, in that case I'm sure you'll need even larger if you plan to actually house the lizards in with the ants too! I had thought of maybe having adjoining enclosures with a tunnel or gate and let the horned lizards roam in to feed when they want, or dump the ants in the other way.

where you at?

it would be much easier on a colony if you were lucky enough to find one that you could enclose in place.

Mick
fireside3@hotmail.com
-----
"When tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign foe."

James Madison

I had been planning in the future of using a concrete block enclosure two feet high, but build it around the ant colony. I would leave samll holes in the block and build around thier paths as well as provide food for them inside the enclosure and just outside the enclosure. I talked to Dr. Snelling about this and he seemed to think this might work as long as they had free movement and food to keep them in there place. The enclosure would be 20 x 10 ft, and the far end away from the ant pile would be filled with river sand and rocks etc to make horned lizard habitat. The horned lizards will find the ants, also would supplement with mini zoophobias from time to time. The top would be covered with a 1/4" Mesh screen and wood frame to keep roadrunners and other out. Since I have not recieved a permit as yet for this project I have not persued it.
-----
Phrynosoma.com

______

signature file edited. [phw 11/14/04]

Lou, are you sure you would even need a permit for something like that in Castroville? doesn't sound like the kind of thing a permit is required for on private property in Texas. especially if you were going to do it on the property outside the city limits. it's a little more socialist in cities like S.A., Austin, and Dallas, but still nothing like Kalifornia yet, as far as requiring permits for everything on your own property. if you did build this in town, they might have some city ordinance requiring "high occupancy dwellings" and "concrete structures" to have fire suppression systems or something!LOL without regards to the rest of the pertinent facts of the matter. that's how city government works
just kidding. I'm sure it's not that bad yet there. you have freedom to destroy harvester ant colonies on your property. I can't see a restriction on keeping them enclosed as opposed to killing them.

I was thinking the same thing, for enclosures in their native area. allow them free access in and out, and provide them with plenty of incintive to stay put. I'm going to have to relocate them to here though. so that means full containment or very nearly. there is more concern for those damn invicta getting in, than pogos getting out! as far as I'm concerned anyway.

Mick
-----
"When tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign foe."

James Madison

The idea of this nature was in conjunction of a captive breeding program, whereby the females captured in the wild or housed with the males would be let go after laying eggs, males would be let go after females are gravid, and then abbaie swould be raised in an "ant envirionment to get optimal health benefits, and the babies would be used for a study program and for repatriation. The Animals would be adopted out for a limited 3 year period whereby the study would track the viability of these horned lizards in captivity, the money would be use from adoption application and adoptions to be put in a conservation fund and used by the state for more study and care of horned lizards. Unfortunately I have written the paper three different times because of new ideas. I have finally settled on a perminent draft if youir interested I can forward to you.........
-----
Phrynosoma.com

______

signature file edited. [phw 11/14/04]

I should have been more clear, I assume if your harboring wild caught HL's this is a violation of the reptile laws even if they are on your land? If you were indiscriminantly killig deer and dove out of season on your property you'd be in trouble if discovered. Likewise if I was capturing or using HL's to propogate a progeny to be used for limited adoptions, one would need to go through the Texas Parks and Wildlife for permisssion to house such. Babies would be fit with a rice size chip for identification. Adopting people would have to be open to a survey twice a year for three years to track the viability of these in the herpticulture. Anyone with a lizard not chipped would be suspect of poaching unless a license or permit could be produced. The ultimate goal behind this is to make all currently legal and illegal sales of horned lizards illegal, and only adopted animals on a limited basis would be allowed to people who can provide an application that is perused by experienced to determine if that person is a good candidate for a horned lizard. I know this flies in the face of a lot of peoples expectations about having horned lizards, but the truth of the matter many or most of the horned lizards sold in the trade legally end up dead within a year, because people don't relize the committment, or try and cut corners on feeding ants, and poor husbandry. Since these of all lizards have no defense for themselves in the business world, I believe that the adoption process could make all sales illegal, and at the same time enter a limited gene pool into the herpticulture and could be duplicated with other horned lizard species as well and this wil also help in maintaining a pool of captive born animals in the herpticulture and thus having these available for the future. Even the rescue animals would or could be used for adoptions and repatriations. At the same time the Parks & WIldlife would be able to identify these animals and any animal without papers would be suspect of poaching and possesion would be considered an offense. You know yourself that there are many wonderful lizards in the herpticulture that people can persue, but these guys need more scrutiny in who is purchasing and the commitment to the animal, thus the adoption idea. This has worked very well in California for Desert Tortises. The application is very indepth and helps determine the abilities of the caretaker. I know I am rambling here from memory but gives you more of an idea as to where my head is.
-----
Phrynosoma.com

______

signature file edited. [phw 11/14/04]

hey Lou,
I'd certainly be interested in the revision. I wanted to take more time and reply to you about the idea. I just haven't been able to. I got dozens of unread messages stacked up from my cousin, articles he wants me to look at. he's a commentator for free market news. and I got like 80 unread messages from various newsgroups in my inbox! LOL too many things on my plate.

>quote< "I assume if your harboring wild caught HL's this is a violation of the reptile laws even if they are on your land?"

actually you bring up an interesting scenario that I had never considered. the parks & wildlife regs., and the statute law from the parks & wildlife code, state that it is a "violation" to do the following; "take", "possess", "transport", "sell", or "offer to sell", without getting the proper scientific or commercial propogation permit. it is also "prohibited" to "capture, trap, take, or kill, or attempt to capture, trap, take, or kill, endangered fish or wildlife."

as far as "harboring" HL's in the way you probably mean it, out of the above prohibited acts, "possession", "capture" and "trap" jumps out as the only real possible conflict. however, if you enclosure your land and certain wildlife just happens to be residing there, that is not necessarily being in "possession" of them. they are not inanimate objects, such as for example, a welding machine, that you might have stolen and placed on your property. such an item would not have moved on it's own and therefore, you would be presumed, "prima facia", "in possession" of it for criminal penal code "theft" purposes. that is why it is almost impossible to charge someone with stealing cattle in Texas, unless they actually cut fence and load them up for transport somewhere. cattle move about. sometimes bulls will break adjoining fences in order to get to cows on another person's property. sometimes people will open fences to let another person's cattle out of the original property and on to the second party's. if these cattle are not marked, they sometimes are hauled off to auction by the thief and sold. it is theft by every moral and ethical definition, but legally there is little that can be done if the livestock are not marked.

as far as the way "possession" is defined criminally in this instance, you would have to "transport" them from somewhere ( other than by their own movement ), or "take" them, ( yourself physically, or they could make the case that "take" means to "accept" from someone else )in order to come into "possession".

the tougher arguement is against "trap" and "capture". you would have to enclose the entire perimeter of your property as a whole, or, have a totally seperate and ligitimate reason for enclosing a smaller area, that just so happened to also contain HL habitat, in order to avoid the definition of "trap" and "capture". a small enclosed area that contained no other apparent reason for being enclosed, other than for the purposes of quartering off an obvious HL habitat, would certainly be seen as either "trapping" or "capturing" them. such a violation is a class C misdemeanor.

but, then again, you could just get the commercial propogation permit too from Texas Parks & Wildlife.

Mick
-----
"When tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign foe."

James Madison

Mick-the bottom line of my whole idea is to work with Parks & WIldlife to manage this as a possible deignee with a permit. SInce the 3 year experiment and tracking is for profit but not commercial, it is pointedly made top develop a temporary account to fund horned lizard research. This could also be done in other states as well. I am against the indiscrimentant sale of horned lizards and like the guy that was one the interent on KIngsnake the other day selling a Califonia Horned lizard under the guiise of adoption is a total sham. So some of the fine details with respect to the money aprt of it may have to be refined, but the general idea of putting out a limited gene pool of horned lizards inot the herpticulture and tracking it's progress via an adoption program, using rescue animals that were slated for the bulldozer or actually raising some using the technique I gave an overview on would work. So far repatriations acording to California and Texas have not worked well for some reason or another, but putting that aside, by using HCLS and or PHrynosoma, a national horned lizard rescue listing could be put up using simple XL and as areas are being encroached upon for building in a certian city or vicinity these people that sign up to help could assist in doing a rescue of the land. Some times it's hundreds or even thousands of acres. Fish & WIld life is too underfunded in this area to do all these creative type of things, but there are organizations such as ours and HCLS and others that could and maybe would finction as a designee for them under a COllection permit for rescue. THe animals would be held breifly and inspected for general overall health and then put up for adoption. This program could work, but the buy-in for me would have to be Parks & Wildlife, Wnedy Hodges in our state (HCLS) and others to put together such a task. Ultimately my paper is written as an open document to all those interested in horned lizards, as this is meant to be an outline and not the detail, I expect academics and non-academics to participate........
-----
Phrynosoma.com

______

signature file edited. [phw 11/14/04]