Food is also a problem for established colonies. Ants are wary of new foods, when the colony learns that they like something they dig right in without hesitation. Pet colonies know how to drink sugar water from a feeder, how to get water to hydrate their nest from a water bottle and they learn to like dubias and feeder flies. In the wild they may have had a heard of aphids, or other complex relations that you break by digging up the colony. Rather than eat the pet food they grow weak.
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