Ant Farm PC

secolactico writes "This has got to be the coolest case mod I've come across. An ant farm in your PC case. Too bad there are no pics of the case actually on a working PC. It'd be interesting to observe the effect that the temperature and vibration of an operating PC would have on the ants."

Comments

They showed a working one...

[grishnav]

I happened to catch the episode where they showed this thing... Yes it works, no the heat/vibrations didn't kill the ants. It was a pretty cool mod.

Re:I preferred these

[ncc74656]

There's no mention of a water filter on the page, and with a tank under 2 gallons, ammonia is going to build up from fish waste very quickly.

In this picture, you can see that there's a small fishbowl-type filter in the tank. I'm not sure how effective they really are (I use an undergravel filter in a 10-gallon tank at work and a hang-on-the-back type of filter on a 55-gallon tank at home), but it appears there was at least some thought put into keeping it livable.

That said, $720 to put what can't be more than a 2-gallon aquarium inside a computer is a bit ridiculous. You can set up a 10-gallon tank (much more room for the fishes) for somewhere around $50, and you'll get better visibility and no chance that a leak will toast your computer. (Besides, my dual-Athlon machines run too hot anyway...fish stew, anyone? :-) )

Keep that Anole!

[interactive_civilian]

I lived in FL for 5 years (4 years of university and then one year of work in Melbourne). All I can say is that the anoles (and any geckos that you may have around the house) are a blessing in the war on fire ants and other insect life.

My room had a door to the outside, so I would leave it open to let the anoles in and probably had a good 4 or 5 living in my room at any given time. Since they were there, the ants were not (nor were the cockroaches/palmetto bugs). They took good care of me and they stayed away from the photography chemicals (my room doubled as a darkroom...guess they didn't like the smell...this was another reason why I would leave my door open).

However, sometimes they did there job a little too well. Though I would rarely find any insect life in my room, there were the sad occasions when I would find a dead and mummified anole when cleaning. :-(

Never found one in my computer case though. I wonder what attracted one to yours (heat? electric field? curiosity?)

Anyway, in the war on bugs (hehe), natures defense turned out to be the best defense in my experience. Especially the geckos. If you have an insect problem and can effectively seal off your house/apartment/room, catch or buy a gecko and set it loose in there. Don't forget to catch it after a few days, because it will probably eat everything and you need to keep it from starving. Then you can either set it free, or keep it in an aquarium and feed it crickets and stuff until you need it to be out and around again.

At least, these were my experiences. YMMV.