6 replies to this topic

[Vendayn]

I at first thought the ants I got were Pheidole navigans. But I'm thinking they actually aren't. Oh and yeah no picture...they are too tiny for any of our cameras. Most likely I'd need samples if I care that much about an ID, but my dad hates doing that so outside of that...its almost certainly either being okay with no ID or maybe the description is enough for a "vague" ID.

 

The big difference is the colony I dug up had dozens of queens. Probably around the tree was close to 100 queens. I ended up with over 30. That is only the wingless females I counted, not ones with wings or wings that came off when I put them in my collecting container. As far as I know, Pheidole navigans nor any of the similar looking Pheidole flaven-complex match a many queened colony. 

 

The other thing I noticed is a distinct lack in males. Lots of winged alate females (but the wings come off easily, though most of the females I got were already wingless) but not a single male. There was no alate brood either...and not much brood to begin with, so later I'll see if I can't find their "main" portion of the colony. It might actually be a lot bigger than I think, since I never found their brood chamber. That or it is actually inside the tree, and I just can't get to it.

 

Now for the description...

 

Tiny. Very tiny. Pretty much Solenopsis molesta worker size. Maybe could be a tad bigger, but look the same length. Around 1.2mm. I don't have anything to measure something so tiny. I had something, but it got packed away. But, if the colony didn't have any soldiers...the workers could easily mistaken for Solenopsis molesta at first glance. Even the color is kinda similar. The soldiers are a bit bigger, but still tiny. The worker and soldier color is also mostly an orange color, not yellow. The soldiers also have a darker abdomen, and a darker colored head (however some soldiers have same color head as their abdomen).

 

The queens are varied in color. Mostly what I see is light brown to darker brown queens. And then some queens have a reddish thorax, but a darker head and a darker abdomen. One single queen I found was actually yellowish in color and kinda clear looking, though could have freshly eclosed. She didn't have wings though, if she did freshly eclose,. But seem to have quite a variety of colors as far as the queens go.

 

And where I dug them up was pretty much inside the bark of a tree. They dug a tiny bit in the soil (very little, but some), but made actual tunnels in the bark where their main nest was. You could see on the outside of the tree where the bark had been tunneled through, and their trail going through it. They had also dug a tiny bit into the tree but the tree is too hard for them to do much more with that. That or I didn't find the main part of their nest like I said, since I doubt the apartments want me tearing apart the tree lol.

 

Activity, I've seen them around and they seem active mostly at night. The colony I got was active in the day though, moving in the tunnel of the bark and exploring the root of the tree. 

 

No mound at all, nor any sign of dirt piled anywhere. Which leads me to believe they are almost entirely a bark/wood nesting species and only very little in the soil. Though they did have a hole in the dirt where the winged female alates were. They probably opened it up to send the winged females out.

 

Colony size I'd say is big. I'd say number of ants (from what I found and saw) was close to 1000, but I probably got 500-600 actual ants in my ant farm. Colony could be even bigger, since I never found their brood chamber which is probably the main part of the nest.

 

The biggest thing I think is how many queens they have/had. None of the species that look like Pheidole navigans or Pheidole flaven-complex have that many queens in a colony as far as I know. Pheidole flaven is the same as Pheidole navigans, where the dominant queen (from what I read on here on this forum with peoples journals and on google) kills the other queens. This is not the case with this colony.

Edited by Vendayn, August 19 2018 - 8:08 PM.

[Vendayn]

So I got three different colonies of this Pheidole sp. The colony from yesterday, and two colonies in different locations (though one could be close enough they budded out if they do that). However, the 2nd colony from today was in no way part of the original I got, since I had to cross two roads and it was quite some distance away. That colony also had actual males, but no female alates. So, each colony seems to produce only one type.

 

However, I combined all colonies and they joined each other like they were part of the same colony. Even though the one colony I got today was pretty far and couldn't be connected by land at all. So, at very least, they seem to co-exist with each colony and there is no inter-species aggression.

 

As for size...workers are smaller than Brachymyrmex workers. Soldiers actually seem about same size. I'd say the workers are actually more the length of Monomorium ergatogyna workers (maybe a tad smaller) than Solenopsis molesta size. Still really tiny though.

 

I think biggest thing I discovered is I can take any ants from any colony inside the apartment complex and put them together. It could be they aren't aggressive ants so they won't fight each other either. They seem pretty timid, and not aggressive at all. They show no aggression toward Argentine ants, Monomorium ergatogyna or Brachymyrmex.

Edited by Vendayn, August 18 2018 - 1:25 PM.

[Vendayn]

Well, I'll make a journal at some point. I'll put this in my anting thread I made too.

 

Despite getting only a little brood (I know I got some, but not as much as I see now)...they already have a giant pile of eggs. And they have other smaller to medium sized piles of eggs in other parts of the ant farm. So, there is definitely multiple queens laying eggs for it to be that many eggs.

 

In fact...they are laying more eggs than my Pheidole megacephala are (which are much bigger, but not nearly as many queens).

 

And as for number of queens. I did estimate, but I got a whole bunch. The colony is/was a lot bigger but I can't get to it since its deep in the bark and people would complain if I take apart the bark of a tree. I know when I was taking a little of it off, I kept seeing lots of queens crawling all over. I'd say easily over 100 queens in just one colony , but I only got about half (maybe a bit more). It was about as many as I see in a huge Monomorium ergatogyna colony. 

Edited by Vendayn, August 19 2018 - 7:02 PM.

[Vendayn]

Also, as an important note. I think the queens look like ergatoid queens to me...like Monomorium ergatogyna have. They lose their wings just as easily as Monomorium ergatogyna female alates lose their wings. And they kinda look similar to me (in terms of size and stockiness), than actual full built stocky queens (like Pheidole megacephala ants have). But maybe not ergatoid queens...I don't know much about ergatoid queens in ants, besides Monomorium ergatogyna. I'm only bringing it up cause the queens look similar to me, and how easy the wings fall off.

 

I'm guessing they aren't native, and I'm having a hard time finding any tiny Pheidole found in California that have multiple queens.

 

I also can find colonies in pretty much every tree inside the apartment complex, they are very common. I can find them in other places besides trees too (like next to our garage is a huge colony, probably nesting under the concrete), but generally they seem to like trees.

[Vendayn]

Spoiler

[Vendayn]

More "unique" behavior (though the behavior is more of that of Pheidole megacephala)

 

They build dirt tunnels. The colony in my ant farm is in process of building a dirt tunnel. As well as the colony outside my apartment unit is building a dirt tunnel as well. Pretty much same looking tunnels as Pheidole megacephala make.

 

They also farm aphids. The colony outside I saw farming aphids on a blade of grass.

 

LC3 in chat said they seem more likely to be Pheidole flavens themselves. While Pheidole flavens tend to have one queen, some ant species introduced to other areas sometimes turn into supercolonies. And maybe the Pheidole flavens are thriving in my local area due to the  climate of the city being a bit more stable (and it always being irrigated helps too).

[Vendayn]

Next interesting thing

 

The wingless female alates (I'm guessing they aren't actually queens, but they definitely have multiple queens since so many eggs are produced each day) act as workers. Even some of the winged female alates act as workers. I put some food in, and they helped the workers and soldiers forage for it.