680 replies to this topic

[antgallery]

Wow I can't wait until Crematogaster starts flying! That will be awesome!

[Kaelwizard]

It would be kind of funny if you let them fly and another ant keeper ends up getting one.

[ANTdrew]

Any thoughts on my theories here?

[NickAnter]

I know my Nylanderia vividula colony plateaued after getting their first queen alates, so maybe they have simply reached max size?

[ANTdrew]

I know my Nylanderia vividula colony plateaued after getting their first queen alates, so maybe they have simply reached max size?

My Nylanderia also have totally plateaued. I guess it’s just part of the life cycle.

[NickAnter]

Yeah, I could have put them in a formicarium half the size of the one they are in.

[ANTdrew]

Cheeto? Anthony? Aaron? What say you?

[AnthonyP163]

I think it could be one of a few things. In some of my Crematogaster colonies, they decide to take a mid-season hibernation. This also sometimes happens with my Camponotus and Formica. I don't know why that would happen, though, because you gave them a very good hibernation, so this mini-hibernation in the middle of July would be silly.

 

I suppose it's worth mentioning I do kind of have a feeling that (up here in cold Wisconsin) after they get alates, they stop brood production for the year. I've noticed this as the case when I find wild colonies of Crematogaster with alates in August. Crematogaster don't seem to need a LOT of workers to defend themselves, as they are pretty good fighters, so perhaps workers are only produced prior to the flight season for each year, just enough to find food/defend for alates (I could be totally wrong). I do think they have a strict sort of life cycle centering around certain milestones such as hibernation and alate production. The fact that your queen has laid eggs is a good sign, though, that this theory is probably not correct, at least in your case.

 

Perhaps they just need a bit more food, or food variety.

 

I don't think this is a natural plateau for them, though, how many workers do you think the colony is now at? That you mentioned the queen has laid a few large egg batches makes it seem like they had just paused for the alate production, and hopefully will soon return producing more workers to give you an even bigger headache 

 

I love this journal, keep up the great work with these ants!

[ANTdrew]

Thank you for the great insights, Anthony. They do seem to have a strict timetable for brood production: lots right after hibernation, a lull, then another surge before hibernation. I think there are definitely several thousands now. I’ve been alternating mealworms and crickets for them recently, but I can aim for more variety if I can find some wild insects. Now I just need Cheeto and Aaron to chime in…

Edited by ANTdrew, July 27 2021 - 2:51 AM.

[CheetoLord02]

Alates definitely throw off worker numbers in colonies. My Pheidole pilifera, after producing alates, crashed from several hundred workers and hundreds of alates to only ~100-200 workers. They are now recovering. Alates take up a lot of resources without providing anything to the colony, so it can cause a decrease in worker numbers or brood production. If your queen has resumed laying, I wouldn't personally worry.

[ANTdrew]

Good to hear! Do you think the queens continue taking in lots of protein even after they eclose?

[ANTdrew]

Now just waiting on Aaron567… He may not read pedestrian journals like this one, though.

[Lillyrose]

I am new so I'm just sharing thoughts, but to me I assumed they would have to take a break when they made alates.

When I hunt ants and brood and find alate brood I never really see any other brood with them. It's either reg or alates in the wild colonies that I've explored.

I kinda took this to me that they can really only focus on the one stage at a time. I imagine it's like those games where you save up resources to build... they saved up resources and spent them all on alates.

[ANTdrew]

I am new so I'm just sharing thoughts, but to me I assumed they would have to take a break when they made alates.

When I hunt ants and brood and find alate brood I never really see any other brood with them. It's either reg or alates in the wild colonies that I've explored.

I kinda took this to me that they can really only focus on the one stage at a time. I imagine it's like those games where you save up resources to build... they saved up resources and spent them all on alates.

That makes good sense.

[jplelito]

Another thought that occurs to me just thinking from the perspective of ant behavior - the colony more or less does what it needs to do, balancing risk and reward. So - a summer pause in brood production could be because, the colony has enough workers and senses (or assumes) a pause in resource availability. You might feed them all they want sure, but “aestivation” is common genetic programming in many insects in hot climates where there is a period in summer of typically dry conditions where Homopteran honeydew might be in short supply for example. Why waste precious energy to make a batch of workers which won’t have anything to harvest and cost a lot to make? And then of course superimpose that cycle with the annual reproductive demands and you can get some complicated mathematical relationships on what behavior(s) are most profitable at any given time. The fact is that a lot has been written on ant foraging but this hobby provides us a unique look at the same time on what brood is doing as well as seasonal cycles etc. that field observations would not so easily yield, especially in arboreal species who keep their brood 50 feet in the air. These longer term colonies like this one - which are hard work and awesome to see blogged about! - are probably teaching us quite a lot. I will be very curious to see if they do the same pattern again next year.

[Kaelwizard]

I am new so I'm just sharing thoughts, but to me I assumed they would have to take a break when they made alates.

When I hunt ants and brood and find alate brood I never really see any other brood with them. It's either reg or alates in the wild colonies that I've explored.

I kinda took this to me that they can really only focus on the one stage at a time. I imagine it's like those games where you save up resources to build... they saved up resources and spent them all on alates.

I actually noticed this with Lasius colonies back in Michigan. They always had one or the other like you have described.

[ANTdrew]

Thanks, Kael. These are great insights. I like how this conversation is uncovering some facets of ant behavior we don’t think about much.

[ANTdrew]

Update 8-19-21

 

 This colony continues to trouble me. They still have a pile of eggs, but they won't hatch, and it seems like the pile has decreased. I can only think that they are feeding new eggs to the queen alates to strengthen them?? This whole experience has really illustrated how much of a drain it is on a colony to produce alates.

 

 

The queens come up and hang out in the Nucleus outworld and head back down when the sun comes up. I wish there was an easy way to remove all of them. Carrying the whole massive three piece setup outside so they could fly would be a two person job, and my wife sure as hell won't help with that. I'm still not sure what I'll do.

 

 

While I was on a trip for three days, the girls staged another jailbreak. Thankfully, they escaped shortly before I got home, so not too many got out. I had to hastily seal the other side of their Nucleus glass with silicone. I had thought that side was sealed enough, but I thought wrong once again.

 

 

 

[AntBoi3030]

If I wasn’t two hours away I’d give you a hand

[DDD101DDD]

Maybe you could suck up the alates and some workers with an aspirater and put them in a smaller nest outside?