19 replies to this topic

[YsTheAnt]

YsTheAnt's Camponotus quercicola Journal: 7/19/2018

 

On March 30th, I went anting with Irishmate03112002 near Mt. Diablo. We managed to catch 14 queens, 7 of which I kept. I gave away 2, and one was infertile, which left me with four queens. After about a month and a half they got their first workers. The queens started laying second batches of eggs about 2-3 weeks after the first nanitic eclosed. They have all layed second batches of eggs, 3 queens actually layed  over 20 eggs for their second batch, and all continue to lay more. I also added oak bark into their outworld, as per @nurbs' advice.

 

All but the colony with the most brood has at least 1 media. [EDIT Well, after reviewing the footage, the colony with the most brood actually does have a small media.]Two of the colonies have majors.

 

These are some of my favorite ants, since they are so massive and calm. I have fed them with my bare hands before and saw no signs of aggression. They are also quite tolerant of being bothered, and don't really care if you shine a light at them or if the desk I keep them on is vibrated.

 

I made a video featuring the colony with the most brood. They should be at around 30 workers by the end of August .

 

Edited by YsTheAnt, July 19 2018 - 5:10 PM.

[Major]

Beautiful ants.

[YsTheAnt]

Thanks!

[TennesseeAnts]

Nice video! Love the colony by the way.

[YsTheAnt]

Thanks!

[YsTheAnt]

Update: 8/1018

Unfortunately, the queen without much brood passed away sometime this week, which wasn’t surprising considering that she stopped producing.

The other colonies are doing great, with the largest one being at around 20 workers. I will post a video of them next week, since I am out of town right now.

Edited by YsTheAnt, August 25 2018 - 9:46 AM.

[Ikerrilove]

Your video has great detail, I hope you post more. Love the close shots of the workers. 

[YsTheAnt]

Update 8/25/18

I got a video of the larger colony with 21 workers. The queen has been laying lots of eggs, they have around 15 now. For some reason I found two worker corpses, but they are still at 21, which is odd. You can see them near the fruit flies in this video.

They have only accepted fruit flies and pure hummingbird nectar concentrate ever since I came back from vacation, which isn’t too concerning as I have a large supply of both. Hopefully they keep up the growth.

The video is a bit blurry since they have dirtied up the tube a lot, sorry about that. I will try to move them into a new one soon.

Edited by YsTheAnt, August 25 2018 - 10:13 AM.

[sirjordanncurtis]

Is that a worker leg on the pupa in the beginning of the video?

[YsTheAnt]

Yeah unfortunately, from one of the workers they killed.

[sirjordanncurtis]

Yeah unfortunately, from one of the workers they killed.

 

That sucks. Really jealous of that huge colony though

[YsTheAnt]

Yeah unfortunately, from one of the workers they killed.

That sucks. Really jealous of that huge colony though

They are some of my favorites .

[YsTheAnt]

Update: 9/15/18

Not much has changed with either colony, the larger one has about 18 workers and the smaller one 12-13. Both have dark pupae and should gain some workers soon. They also have nice freshly laid eggs, and all workers are now full sized, as all 7 nanitics have unfortunately passed away. I think this is the reason they have stayed about the same this month, despite new workers by the week.

The third colony was sold a while back.

On a side note, I managed to successfully introduce the deceased queen's workers from a month ago into the larger colony, which helped to make up for the loss of nanitics.

Edited by YsTheAnt, September 15 2018 - 4:50 PM.

[Rstheant]

How many workers do you quercicola have currently ?

[YsTheAnt]

Update: 12/22/18

The smaller colony is down to nine workers , hopefully they will recover after hibernation. The larger colony is now at 27 workers and surprisingly the queen layed more eggs two weeks ago.

Both colonies will go into hibernation shortly, I will update this when I catch more or they come out of diapause.

Edited by YsTheAnt, December 22 2018 - 1:57 PM.

[B_rad0806]

Update?

[YsTheAnt]

Soon! I just finished taking a video of them and will update this tonight or tommorow.

[NickAnter]

What about that update?

Soon! I just finished taking a video of them and will update this tonight or tommorow.

[YsTheAnt]

Ah I must have forgotten. I still have the big colony from that update, but its dwindled down to just 2-3 workers. I have a few colonies from queens I purchased this year that I will add to this journal, if anyone would like to see that then let me know and I'll start updating this again.

[NickAnter]

I would like to see more updates.