Suitable Artificial Food for Weaver Ant Farming (Oecophylla smaragdina Fabricius)

Abstract

The weaver ant (Oecophylla smaragdina Fabricius) is an important edible commercial insect of Thailand. Weaver ant farming has been increasing its popularity among local people. Artificial food supply is one of the most important factors for the weaver ant farming because it is convenient for the close-sys tem farming. This study aimed to optimize the appropriate artificial food formula for weaver ant farming. Therefore, six artificial food formulas were provided to the weaver ant colonies, namely pork-jelly, fish-jelly, cricket-jelly, pork-flour, fish-flour, and cricketflour.
We compared the number of workers feeding on each diet for 60 minutes in laboratory as well as under natural conditions. We further compared the survival rate of ant broods and pupae among the six diets in laboratory. The workers from both laboratory and natural colonies consumed mos tly the artificial food made from cricket-jelly and fish-jelly. This was because these jellies had attractive smell and due their soft consis tency they were easily manipulated by the workers. In laboratory conditions, a huge number of workers was immediately attracted to the feeding sites. In contras t, only small number of workers could be found at the feeding site under natural conditions. The number of workers feeding momentary differed significantly between the natural and laboratory sites P<0.05. The highes t survival rates of ant broods (88.33%) and pupae (99.72%) were in the group fed by the cricket-jelly formula.