On Monday I came home from work and found an ants nest in Odin's indoor enclosure under his food dish, fortunately they are just picnic ants (no fire ants in the great north woods!) Heck of a thing how fast they colonized as I had removed his dish to give it a cleaning less than a week before, but anyway, we removed all the trays, threw out all the substrate in two of them, put in new substrate (a 50/50 mix of coco coir and organic soil-all we had on hand in a pinch) and replaced the other two with new garden trays while the other two we removed sit in the cold garage to make sure they are clear. We gave the whole enclosure a good vacuuming, soaked all the rocks and food and water dish in near boiling water for a good hour and them put it mostly back together, but some things are moved around and not everything is put back while we wait to make sure the ant problem is under control. No poisons, ant killing products or cleaning products have been used.
Since then he seems confused or angry and a little clumsy? He patrols the enclosure as if he is lost, swishing his tail dramatically back and forth as he stomps about and he continually goes over to the area where the nest was and pokes his nose at the wall and substrate. Not ramming it, just poking at it, reminds me of a guy poking someone in the chest like they are looking for a fight, if that makes sense. And sometimes he kind of bumps into stuff like he doesn't see it or doesn't expect it to be there. He is still eating and all of that, none of the temps or humidity has changed and he looks as handsome as ever. There are still a few ants and I am using the see-em and squish method for now as I would rather not use anything that could harm my little guy.
I don't know if I should be concerned or amused. I know how stubborn and set in their ways they are, but aside from the different substrate mix, the changes are pretty minor.
Since then he seems confused or angry and a little clumsy? He patrols the enclosure as if he is lost, swishing his tail dramatically back and forth as he stomps about and he continually goes over to the area where the nest was and pokes his nose at the wall and substrate. Not ramming it, just poking at it, reminds me of a guy poking someone in the chest like they are looking for a fight, if that makes sense. And sometimes he kind of bumps into stuff like he doesn't see it or doesn't expect it to be there. He is still eating and all of that, none of the temps or humidity has changed and he looks as handsome as ever. There are still a few ants and I am using the see-em and squish method for now as I would rather not use anything that could harm my little guy.
I don't know if I should be concerned or amused. I know how stubborn and set in their ways they are, but aside from the different substrate mix, the changes are pretty minor.
