28 replies to this topic

[TennesseeAnts]

Found a queen and few workers in a twig in early February. They weren't doing as well as I'd hoped, so I gave them some workers from an unrelated colony. They got along great too. Now I've been doing Camponotus colony fusion for a while now, and I have never seen Camponotus accept other workers this readily before. Now today I found a mature colony that had no queen for some reason. I collected several dozen workers and two female alates. I am adding the workers to my colony as I'm writing this, and they are getting along great with the other workers and their new queen so far.

Edited by Ant_Dude2908, May 30 2019 - 4:34 AM.

[TennesseeAnts]

But the weird thing is, there were only about 60-75 workers and the two winged females. No males. And I emptied the entire twig, and the twigs around the twig, and found nothing. And the females can't open their wings and fly at all... Maybe those females are the queens? Any suggestions?

Edited by Ant_Dude2908, March 6 2019 - 3:10 PM.

[Rstheant]

Usually mated queens that have wings don’t use their wings, only alates and delates can fly. About the drones, some colonies produce drones when they are in the 400s or somewhere like that. Of course, in some cases, drones come earlier.

[TennesseeAnts]

Yeah I confirmed the queens are sterile.

[TennesseeAnts]

I found EVEN MORE satellite nests. Got around 500 workers and 50 drones plus 40 ish females. All getting introduced one by one... This is going to take a while.... This is the fastest growing of any Camponotus! Lol. Yesterday they had 10 workers. Now I have a "mature colony"!

[Rstheant]

Yeah well, but you introduced more workers to a current colony. But, who cares???

[TennesseeAnts]

They grew up so quick! Now I have the problem of finding a good nest for my 500 worker colony...

[Rstheant]

So you went to drtrmiller’s thread to see if he had a old nest available? Just get a Casita or something from Tar Heel Ants.

[TennesseeAnts]

Whaaaat? I never went to an two year old thread... A Casita does sound good though...

[Rstheant]

This?

http://www.formicult...ts/#entry109532

I’m just joking.

[TennesseeAnts]

the nest he made looks like an Antkit nest.

[TennesseeAnts]

3-10-19

 

Well, the alates were NOT fond of this new queen, so they tried to kill her... She is safe now though. I will have to kill the female alates.

[Leo]

Maybe the alates killed the old queen too...

[TennesseeAnts]

I say new queen because I only collected satellite nests. The queen is my queen from a few months ago.

[TennesseeAnts]

Ok.... So you know I used several different colony's satellite nests, right? Well it appears that the males from one colony bred with one or more of the female alates... So if she gets workers....

[TennesseeAnts]

Well that colony crashed HARD. Luckily for me, I found one to replace it. The experiment is over, so I changed the topic name. This colony has just about 100 workers and some small larvae. I am moving them from their collection container into a nest that I made specifically for smaller Camponotus. It is basically two halfs of a CD case glued together with cork in the middle. The cork absorbs the water and only needs hydrated once a month. The ants dig their own chambers.

[TennesseeAnts]

3-19-19

 

So the larger colony has dug some comfy little chambers! They have some small larvae as well. Here are some pics of the colony in the test-tube.

 

 

Edited by Ant_Dude2908, March 19 2019 - 10:31 AM.

[xTNxANTMANx]

I started my colony with just a queen and some brood she had. She was my first and has been doing great. No boost or anything. She has at least 50 workers maybe more. And btw, yea ill trade my biggest Formica pallidefulva colony. I will say tho my subbarbatus colony has to be one of my favorites. Not small but not huge in size (size of workers that is not size as in numbers) and are polymorphic. 

[TennesseeAnts]

Yeah I'm not sure if they are Myrmentoma or not. They are double the size of C. caryae or nearcticus.

Edit: Do you have a journal for any of your colonies?

Edited by Ant_Dude2908, March 21 2019 - 4:24 AM.

[xTNxANTMANx]

If ur talking to me I started a journal a few yrs ago but I don't think it was on this site. I have so many inverts to care for I don't really have time to do a journal for each or even my favs. All the colonies I have though have all been started from a nuptial flight queen. I have 2 Tetramorium immigrans (had 4 but a mouse...long story lol) colonies that I traded for but they only had around 8 nanitics when I received them. I plan to either let one of them go back into the wild or trade/sell it. They are like fire ants...reproduce like crazy! But are a lot smaller than I like. I'd say my Camponotus subbarbatus are about as small as I like. Also, anyone in this thread that is in middle-west TN, keep an eye out for (preferably) Solenopsis richteri but Solenopsis invicta will work. I hope to get lucky and find a couple down the road at my mother's residence but just in case, if anyone stumbles across any, I'd be willing to trade/sell for them. Oh, same with Camponotus castaneus.