63 replies to this topic

[dspdrew]

Update 3-13-2014
 
Both colonies are doing great still. The colony in the setup with two test tubes are still constantly moving their brood back and forth between the tubes. Lately they have been piling some of it in the corner of the foraging container from time to time. This same colony also seems to be producing an alate, so we'll see what becomes of it.
 
You can see the alate pupa here.
 

 

 

A nice new pile of eggs.
 

[dspdrew]

Update 3-27-2014
 
I removed the tin foil from the test tube of the colony with just that test tube laying in the foraging container, and could finally see the whole colony after not being able to ever since putting them in this container. It looks like they have around 50 or so workers. They now have completely knocked down the mound that they previously built over the entrance of their test tube.
 
The larger colony had its one female alate eclose today. She looks like a perfectly normal alate, just a tiny bit smaller than the queen. This colony now has about 150 workers.
 
Workers stand guard at the entrance to their nest. They just stand there motionless, completely covering the inside of the nylon elbow that connects the test tube containing all the big larvae and pupae to the out world. The weird thing is, there's hardly any of them guarding the other tube that contains the queen and small larvae.
 

 
 
Here are some pictures and a video of the new female alate that eclosed today.
 

[dspdrew]

 

[LAnt]

Are you planning on putting them into a formicarium soon?

[dspdrew]

Probably not too soon, I have so many projects going on it might be a while before I get one made.

[dspdrew]

Update 5-18-2014
 
I moved the larger colony back into a simple one-test-tube-in-a-foraging-container setup again. Right now their population is up to about 175 workers; one alate, with another on the way; and a whole lot of brood. The first alate is still getting along just fine with her sisters, and even gets her wings cleaned from time to time.

 

The smaller colony is still only at about 50 workers, but also has two alates forming.

 

Here's the latest video of the largest colony.

 

[dspdrew]

It looks like they do like Lucky Charms after all. You can see they actually chewed a hole right through a pink heart and are storing all the crumbs.
 

[dspdrew]

Update 6-21-2014
 
The smaller colony looks like it's been shrinking a bit in size lately and I'm not sure why exactly. Right now I'm counting about 45 or so workers. I was seeing that they had a few alate brood, but I'm not sure if they're still there or not.
 
The larger colony is doing really well. Since I moved my Myrmecocystus colony out of the experimental formicarium, I decided to let these guys move in. In the process I was able to get a much more accurate count on these, and it turns out they have about 220 workers. They had another alate eclose, but both that one and the older one seemed to have disappeared suddenly. Other than one definite alate pupa, I was seeing more brood that looked like it may be more alates as well, but I'm not sure because they also now have some regular worker pupae that are huge and should be producing some workers as large as the largest I have seen in wild mature colonies. I put all the same dirt and seeds they had in the foraging container into the out world of the formicarium so they of course started sticking it all over the plastic making a bit of a mess and making it harder and harder to view them every day.
 
They moved in pretty quick, and in the process had to drag the queen back into the nest a few times as she kept trying to leave. One time she came out and just started laying eggs right in the out world; I never realized how fast those things shoot out of her.
 
Here's a video of one of the workers dragging her back into the nest, treating her a bit like a push broom in the process.
 

 
 
Shortly after moving in, they of course piled everything from the out world into one of the corners probably in an attempt to create their mound.
 

 
 
They've already made quite a mess so far, but at least they seem to like it. You can see some of that very large brood they have now in a couple of the chambers.
 

 

[dspdrew]

Update 7-9-2014
 
First of all, I've decided to sell my smaller colony, so if anybody in the Southern California area is interested in adopting these, send me a PM or contact AntsCanada. The colony has about 40 or so workers I think (it's hard to tell because they've covered up the test tube pretty good).
 
As for the larger colony, ever since I put them in my experimental formicarium, they have exploded in growth. Maybe it's the moisture, I don't know... but that's good news for my formicarium. Within the first week of having them in there, I noticed the queen was laying another pile of eggs every night until they had this massive clump of eggs. They have stuck all sorts of junk all over the plastic making it very difficult to see them. I notice also that they bring a lot of seeds down into the very bottom chambers where it's very moist. I'm not exactly sure why they do this, and I'm really surprised that there's absolutely no mold in there. I did drop a few springtails into the nest, but it's hard to believe that those few springtails could be stopping all of that from molding. I gave them a bunch of grass seed, and they seem to keep all of that laid out flat in the corner of the out world near the entrance to their nest. They also like to bring their brood out (mainly pupae and large larvae) and lay it out flat in that same corner too. They will have it out all day long while bringing it back in at times, usually when they get alarmed. I gave them a piece of bacon almost a month ago, and they still have that laying near the nest entrance where they nibble on it constantly.
 

 

 

 

[LAnt]

How does that shadow work in the first picture?

Edited by LAnt, July 9 2014 - 9:31 PM.

[Gregory2455]

How much does the smaller colony cost?

[dspdrew]

100 dollars right now, but you would have to contact Mikey Bustos at AntsCanada actually.

[dspdrew]

Update 9-21-2014
 
This colony has been blowing up in size. Right now it has around 700 workers, and 300 brood. It's still being kept in the prototype formicarium. I had to refill the water tank the other day, which was not easy. Since that part of the design hasn't been worked on yet, I had to separate the out world from the nest in order to get inside it to refill the tank. They still like to lay all their brood out in the out world, I assume to warm them under the hot light.

 

[Gregory2455]

Nice colony! I wonder if mine will get to be this big. 

[dermy]

That's a pretty big colony!

[LAnt]

They seem like they can use some more room

[dspdrew]

Not now. The colony's shrunk quite a bit for some reason.

[dspdrew]

Update 12-8-2014
 
So over the last month and a half this colony seemed to be shrinking. The other day I counted only 350 workers, and there was just a fraction of the brood that was there before. With the latest discovery of my Veromessor chewing half way through the Ytong in my other formicarium, I started getting suspicious. My curiosity lead me to the round vent hole in the back of the formicarium, where I took a peak inside with a flashlight. I couldn't believe it. There were Pogonomyrmex workers crawling all over the place. With the chambers a lot emptier now, I managed to spot the hole in the Ytong up in the top corner of the bottom right chamber. There were as many workers going in and out of this hole as there are going in and out of the nest entrance at the top. I'm assuming, or I guess I should say hoping, the other 350 workers, brood, and the queen are all back there inside that base container. I'm so lucky Pogonomyrmex can't climb smooth surfaces, and that I didn't cut out the back of the container on this prototype like I did the other one, or that would have been a real disaster. Imagine 350 ants with the worst sting in North America crawling all over your apartment. As soon as I finish the next round of prototypes with the Ytong replaced by something they can't chew through, I'll be moving them. Until then I guess they can just stay where they are; they're obviously happy there.

[Crystals]

I am beginning to think that our ants just sit around planning ways to take us by surprise. 

[DesertAntz]

I remember being stung by a Pogonomyrmex when I was a child. It hurt pretty bad but I didn't know they had such a sting to be considered the worst in North America. Yikes.