I havn't written for a couple of days, not much too report until today that is.

The title of the blog is Life and Death, and thats with good reason.  Yesterday i had my first ant death, and hands up all those that guessed it was a Messor Barbarus that drowned!  Yep, I woke up yesterday morning and checked the ants, only to find an MB face down in a small (and I do mean small) drop of liquid.  Now, I have read on other sites, mainly AHW that this is a common occurance for this species.  Although I was a little sceptical, I can now confirm it to be a truth.  Do NOT put liquids in with your Messor Barbarus unless it is soaked up by cotton wool for instance.  Poor little bugger.  I'm still worried about the MB's not really quite sure how well they are doing.  Patience I suppose.

The Myrmica Ruginodis are absolutely storming at the moment.  I think with the introduction of more protein foods (crickets) they have increased the size of the nest even further.

The picture shows the three nurserys within the formicarium.  There was previously only one.  In nursery 1 (left) are larvae (J shaped eggs), in nursery 2 (center) are small larvae, and in nursery 3 (right) are pupae and eggs.  The queen is also living in nursery 3 now.  You may think that there are 4 chambers, but the chamber above the center nursery is actually all the same thing.  If I had to estimate how many eggs are currently in the chambers if would be about 60, and when hatched that would double the number of MR's. Yay!