How to remove the ants from ant-plants?

Question

Does anyone here know a method on how to remove the ants from the genus Macaranga plants? Actually from Myrmecophytic macaranga.

It's for a science project.

They are ant-plants.

So the ants is the defence mechanism of this type of Macaranga species.

The ants actually live inside its domatia so it's kind of hard to remove them.

If we're going to use insecticides, it might damage the plant.

So what's a good method to remove the ants only for a while just to study them?

I hope someone will answer to this..

Answer 1

I don't know of any effective non-invasive methods to get remove all of the ants from an ant-plant, but if you just want to study a few of the ants, you could either put out a little "pot" of nectar (aka sugar water) on one of the branches of the plant, or place a few aphids or similar phytophagous insects on a branch... the latter strategy especially will get your ants quite excited, and a number of them will come out to "defend" the plant. Then, with a pooter, brush, or similar, you can suck up or sweep off the ants into a dish.

Pooter: http://www.show.me.uk/site/make/Natural-...

Happy studying!