Update #0: L. flavus introduction
Welcome to my Lasius flavus journal! I've had this colony for a while and have finally decided to start a journal about them
Growth of this colony has been slow compared to my Lasius niger colony which was started only three days before this one
In my country Lasius flavus is colloquially called the yellow meadow ant. In the wild they live almost entirely off honeydew from plant root aphids where they get most of their nutrients from. Because of their subterranean lifestyle they are rarely seen above ground unless you start tilting rocks along grass fields (in the Netherlands at least), or during the nuptial flights
A short summary of this colony of the past few years:
17 July 2018: Caught a few L. flavus queens
30 August 2018: First nanitics!
1 November 2018: First hibernation (picture taken a few weeks before). They end the first year with ~30 workers. I gave 9 flavus colonies away and kept 1
19 October 2019: One year later, they enter their second hibernation with ~250 workers
29 September 2020: One year later, they go into their third hibernation with maybe ~500 workers? They're still kept in a tubs & tubes set-up
6 April 2021:
The colony was taken out of the fridge mid February
They hibernated with a nice amount of larvae, which developed into large piles of pupae as they left diapause. Lots of growth soon!
I decided to make a small Ytong nest for them because the test tubes setup didn't really let me observe them
Their new home:
Also hooked up an outworld with soil from my garden (baked to sterilize it):
Placed them into their new outworld:
They wouldn't move so I eventually resorted to dumping them (except for the queen's tube):
Pupae were the first to be moved into the nest:
A small number of naked pupae as well:
Most of them have moved in now! (except for the queen and a couple dozen workers) :
Edited by Wegmier, April 7 2021 - 9:30 AM.
