The ants for your ant farm (supplied after you have bought it so that live ants don't have to sit around on the shelves for months on end) will probably be harvester ants. Probably from the genus Pogonomyrmex. There are many individual Pogonomyrmex species in North America and they are usually seed eaters.



If you did Latin at school, you'll know than Pogon is Latin for beard so the name pogonomyrmex actuall means 'ant with a beard'. It refers to the small whiskers that appear on the underside of the head in some species. If you get the right species, you might be lucky enough to see these with a strong magnifying glass.

Harvester ants are normally found in dry, arid (or xeric) localities and are found more in the west than in the east. The most common species are P. occidentalis, the western harvester and P. barbatus, the red harvester and these are found in the mid west. Some species, notably the California harvester, P. Californicus and P. magnacanthus, can tolerate much higher temperatures and can be found foraging for seeds at 130oF. They can be found in Death Valley and the Mojave Desert.

Nest building The type of nest constructed by an ant colony depends very much on the species and some species are able to exploit a much wider variety of soils or habitat types than others. The red harvester prefers loamy soils and actually avoids pure sand although other species, such as the Florida harvester actually requires it to build a nest.

As the name, harvester, implies many of these ant species are country dwellers. Some, such as the western harvester, however will venture into cities and can be seen tunnelling under paving stones and the like.

Some species choose to dig downwards in level soil although others might dig directly into vertical surfaces. This behaviour makes it easy to dispose of waste tunnelling material. Others may decide to build their nests under fallen logs or rocks. Presumably, if large enough, such a rock would provide protection from large ant-eating animals. It's usual for nests to be constructed below the surface of the ground but sometimes they can be raised structures, dome-shaped and almost 3 feet high. In a natural setting the nest comprises a highly complicated network of tunnels and chambers of many different sizes and types. The tunnels can be anything from a sixteenth to half an inch in diameter and can be six inches in length. Researchers have found flowers, of all things in the brood chambers of some nests. It is believed that this is for humidity control rather than any aesthetic purpose!

If your ant farm is built of two plates, then the ants are restricted to 2 dimensions and therefore the pattern of tunnels will be a lot more simple but you should still be able to make out chambers of various sorts as these are quite common.