245 replies to this topic

[dspdrew]

11-10-2013
 
 
On November 10th 2013, I traded two of my Pogonomyrmex subnitidus colonies with jimbodw07 for two Myrmecocystus mexicanus colonies. These queens had their mating flight on August 21st, 2013.
 
Major
 

 

 

 
 
Male
 

 

 

 
 
One colony has a worker, two pupae, and five larvae, and the other colony has two workers, one pupae, and 15 larvae.
 

 

 

 

[dspdrew]

Update 11-14-2013
 
A day after I obtained these colonies, both queens laid more eggs, and today I see that one of them now has two new nanitics. The colony that had only one worker, now has three, and about five new eggs. The colony that had two workers, still has only two workers, but a pile of about 15 new eggs. I just recently fed them and now the queens' gasters are huge. Here's some new pictures I took.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Crystals]

I never realized how pale those queens were.

 

So, what is on the menu?  The larvae seem to be enjoying it.

[dspdrew]

I never realized how pale those queens were.

 

So, what is on the menu?  The larvae seem to be enjoying it.

Just a yummy cricket dipped in honey.

[jimbodw07]

Wow! I'm so glad they are doing well! The ones I have in dirt setups are reproducing very quickly. I'll keep an eye out on this thread. I'm curious as to how they'll do in the future. :-)

[dspdrew]

Wow! I'm so glad they are doing well! The ones I have in dirt setups are reproducing very quickly. I'll keep an eye out on this thread. I'm curious as to how they'll do in the future. :-)

Cool, I'm wondering the same about the Pogonomyrmex. I hope you make a journal.

[jimbodw07]

The Pogonomyrmex's are doing just fine. Actually they've got more eggs and pupae now. Man I'm so happy with these Pogonomyrmex's! Yeah I'm gonna get started on both journals today.

[dspdrew]

Update 11-30-2013
 
Both colonies are still doing well, and growing. The largest one now has eight cocoons, and another brand new batch of eggs. I noticed one of the cocoons is a bit larger than all the others.
 

 

 

[dspdrew]

Update 12-25-2013
 
One colony now has seven workers, and the other has eight. The colony with eight workers is the one that had the large pupa, which is now one really large full-sized worker.

[dspdrew]

Update 12-28-2013
 
The largest colony now has 12 workers and a really large, new pile of eggs.

[dspdrew]

Update 12-31-2013
 
I just noticed today that the two large workers in the 12 worker colony are actually their first two repletes; their gasters have been getting bigger and bigger every day. I guess I better start getting some sort of formicarium build for these guys soon. I'll try to get some photos later today.
 

 

 

 

 

[dspdrew]

Update 1-3-2014
 
Today I moved one of these colonies into a foraging container and opened up their test tube.

[Servercheck]

The repletes look so cool!

[dspdrew]

One of the repletes really filled up on humming bird nectar and I got a few good pictures.
 

 

 

 

 

[Crystals]

Haha.  Now how can you be sure that it is hummingbird nectar? 

 

I think that is the first red replete I have ever seen.  She looks pretty in red. 

[dspdrew]

Update 2-7-2014
 
The colony with the foraging container now has a little feeder bottle in there with humming bird nectar in it, so as you can imagine, there are now tons of repletes all blown up like big red balloons. The other colony was still in just a test tube until yesterday, when I put them into the out world of a small rough prototype of a formicarium I've been in the process of designing. Now I'm just waiting for them to move into it. Today I moved them right underneath the same bright lights my Pogonomyrmex containers are under, to hopefully encourage them to move. I'll have another update once they get moved in.
 
Edit: I wanted to speed things along, so I just dumped everything out of the test tube and into the out world. It didn't take long for them to decide the best place to stash all the brood was down in the nest. Once all the brood was in there, they started dragging the queen in (shown in the first video below). Unfortunately, I think I may have damaged the replete in the process. I noticed the next day that the workers completely drained it; hopefully she'll survive.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
The workers were pretty anxious to get the queen down into their new nest. Once they had finished moving all the brood in there, they started dragging her in. You can see it just a little ways into this video, it's kind of funny.
 

 
 
The workers taking good care of their queen and brood once in the new nest.
 

[Zeiss]

You should try making them all different colors...

[Anthony]

Do a Christmas tree affect does anyone know if there are a similar species in Colorado

[dspdrew]

Do a Christmas tree affect does anyone know if there are a similar species in Colorado

According to AntWeb, you have four species, one of which is M. mexicanus, the species these most likely are.

 

http://www.antweb.or...ct=coloradoants

[Anthony]

Thank you very much