28 replies to this topic

[ReignofRage]

Update 13.x.2021

Here's a more proper update that I've been neglecting to do, hope you enjoy.

 

 

C. essigi - This colony has a nice amount of larvae that have started to pupate. There is also now a major, it's not nearly as large as it'll be, but that's expected with it being from the third generation of workers.

 

 

 

C. festinatus - This colony has a decent amount of brood, which has started to enclose. Besides minors, there has been one male and one major from this generation.

 

 

 

C. ocreatus - Up to four workers now. The queen has also laid some more eggs recently as well.

 

 

 

C. sp. - This colony has finally started to feed the larvae a lot more, there's also pupae now. I've been heavily feeding protein to try to get a different cast out of them; so far I've go full size workers though.

 

 

 

C. yogi - And to finish off this update, here's some pictures of another C. yogi queen. I am assuming that these will go into diapause and then lay spring due to how cold the area gets where I caught them. A multi-queen test is going to happen, since I'm deciding to risk it. Other than that, here is a link to a YouTube video of this queen drinking sugar water.

Edited by ReignofRage, October 13 2021 - 1:32 PM.

[ReignofRage]

Update 20.xi.2021

 

 

C. essigi - This colony has continued to grow, now reaching close to 40 workers. The brood pile has just continued to grow over time as well.

 

 

 

C. festinatus - Now up to three tubes and at least 70 workers now. The queen just has not stopped pumping out eggs recently and the majors have been getting larger and larger.

 

 

 

C. ocreatus - Now up to ten workers and a bit of brood. This colony thought it would be smart to flood their setup with a feeder of sugar water, which was fun to deal with when the workers spaz as bad as Formica.

 

 

 

C. sp. - This species has gotten to just over 40 workers by now and the last bit of brood has been developing nicely. I'm trying to rush the last pupae to enclose so I can put the colony into diapause. I have noticed that there is larvae that have gotten ready for diapause, so hopefully it won't take much longer.

 

 

 

C. yogi - So, only the queens from the first flight I went to have laid. Which of the 14 that did lay they have started to have workers enclosing. I do not think any of the eight queens I gave away for free have laid yet - I know only the status of two of them and they have not laid yet.

[Antkeeper01]

 

Update 20.xi.2021

 

 

C. essigi - This colony has continued to grow, now reaching close to 40 workers. The brood pile has just continued to grow over time as well.

 

 

 

C. festinatus - Now up to three tubes and at least 70 workers now. The queen just has not stopped pumping out eggs recently and the majors have been getting larger and larger.

 

 

 

C. ocreatus - Now up to ten workers and a bit of brood. This colony thought it would be smart to flood their setup with a feeder of sugar water, which was fun to deal with when the workers spaz as bad as Formica.

 

 

 

C. sp. - This species has gotten to just over 40 workers by now and the last bit of brood has been developing nicely. I'm trying to rush the last pupae to enclose so I can put the colony into diapause. I have noticed that there is larvae that have gotten ready for diapause, so hopefully it won't take much longer.

 

 

 

C. yogi - So, only the queens from the first flight I went to have laid. Which of the 14 that did lay they have started to have workers enclosing. I do not think any of the eight queens I gave away for free have laid yet - I know only the status of two of them and they have not laid yet.

 

can  you save a queen for me?(for if my permit gets approved)

[ReignofRage]

can  you save a queen for me?(for if my permit gets approved)

I still have plenty C. yogi to sell in Spring, giving away eight was just for proving a point.

Edited by ReignofRage, November 20 2021 - 1:38 PM.

[ReignofRage]

Update 5.xii.2021

 

All colonies are doing well, unfortunatle all besides the yogi are in tub and tubes making it difficult to take pictures of. The essigi colony is above 40 workers now and has a couple more medians. The colony also has a giant pile of brood which has continued to develope. My festinatus colony was moved into a petri dish formicarium a couple weeks ago and was moved to my desk since they are not light sensitive. The majors have been getting noticeably bigger as well, some being bigger than a Cali fragilis queen. As for the ocreatus colony, it's been chugging along getting workers here and there. There's now 15 workers and still an ever growing brood pile. The unidentifiable Camponotus colony is slowly growing now, though it has been producing workers that are the largest so far. The thing is, this colony is being a slight bit difficult, it has brood of all ranges, but it has 2nd instar larvae that are obviously waiting for diapause. So, I've just been kinda waiting for at least the pupae to eclose before putting them into diapause. Lastly, All the yogi with brood are developing nicely. I did move all besides five into a 77-80 degree incubator and am keeping the other five at 85. The ones at 85 are now to workers, one even having four workers now. These five will most likely become my personal colonies.

Edited by ReignofRage, December 5 2021 - 5:59 PM.

[ReignofRage]

Update 27.xii.2021

All colonies are doing well, no colonies are in decline.

 

The C. essigi colony has slowed down a bit due to me not feeding enough protein, which I will change soon. The colony still has a massive pile of brood and all workers are alive.

 

Since the move, the C. festinatus colony did not produce brood for a while due to the second petri dish that I had connected becoming their new foragin area instead of their actual foraging area where all the food and water was... dumb ants. I have since removed the second petri dish after a death toll of around 15 workers and no brood production. After removing the dish the queen pumped out a big egg pile which is now a few piles of nicely developing larvae. The worker deaths have also slowed back to a normal rate. 

 

The C. ocreatus colony has been doing amazing, over 20 workers and a very large worker that noticeably outsized the rest has recently eclosed. The larger worker also has a slight more bit of coloring than the first generation, it has darkened scapes instead of being fully concolor tan. I am hoping that even more coloring comes through in the next few generations. The brood pile also is ever increasing as well.

 

The unidentifiable Camponotus colony I have has been growing steadily since last time as well. A few very larger workers are wondering around and it appears as if the opaque shrived larvae that were waiting for diapuse have started to developmore. I do not know why, but the pile of larvae that were waiting for diapause and had not developed for weeks have now slowly started to develop. The larvae are now going back to the normal slight translucent and also have grown in size. I do not know what caused this change, but I'm not complaining.

 

Lastly, I moved the C. yogi queens back to the warmer incubator because I had noticed that a couple laid eggs and I also wanted the brood to develop further. Since then almost ten colonies have gotten workers and are growing well, I do not know where the misconception of them being very slow came from. Also, I do have a nest idea for a couple colonies which I will try out and share when the matrials arrive.

[ReignofRage]

Update 21.i.2022

Not a whole lot has changed for the most part with my Camponotus. I have sold my C. essigi colony which is the most significant change. Another change would be moving my C. festinatus back to tub and tubes as they just seemed to not do well in the petri dish nest for some reason. 

 

 

So, you might not even be able to see any brood, but trust me there is some. The queen laid a new batch of eggs last night which is perfect since she had around 15 small larvae before that. I'm not too sure why, but the colony has not been able to get larvae to grow since the majority of the brood went through the motions and became workers. This unfortunately has stunted their growth and has meant there are no workers to replace the lost ones. Though the colony has not suffered too much with their decline in numbers they are a bit smaller. The queen luckily has not suffered and is still quite healthy.

 

 

And as usual, I can't go without saying how much I like this colony both for their looks and behaviors. Eventually I do want to make a museumesque formicarium and outworld for this colony. I would do a vivarium, but I would like to keep full view of the inner of the colony.

 

 

My C. ocreatus on the other hand has been non-stop growing with brood. Matter of fact the queen laid a new batch of eggs a couple days ago. They now have two 12-13mm minors which do appear to be full sized, which I have heard isn't uncommon in C. ocreatus.

 

 

They also have a very large larva which seems to be growing larger than that of the 12mm minors, so hopefully it'll be a different caste. The colony is in total around 21 or 22 workers currently and many larvae close to pupating and a handful of pupae ready to eclose. It's a little hard to see, but the egg pile is fairly big and seems fairly larger than the previous two.

 

 

I think this colony will probably go into a labrynth style formicarium. I do want to make a kind of drawer system with each "drawer" being a labrynth-style nest and a foraging area on top.

 

 

As for my unidentifiable Camponotus colony, they have been growing very slow since there is not much brood that is developing. I do think it's very possible that because of how warm I kept them the queen laid a batch of eggs that she shouldn't have and thus there was brood that was still pupating and eclosing mixed with larvae waiting to go into diapause. 

 

 

I think I may have to unfortunately put this colony into diapause sometime within the next month if the queen does not lay by then. Either than that the colony still has decent amount of brood which is comprised of around 40 or so larvae. Some of these larvae are not waiting for diapuase which is mildly annoying.

 

 

I still am excited for this colony to get 20mm majors which will be fun to watch. 

 

 

And lastly there is all the C. yogi that I have. Every single queen and colony has brood. I currently have nine colonies with workers, which will soon be a few more. This would be eleven, but I gave a couple colonies with workers to Zeiss. As for all the founding queens, they have all laid by now. My largest colony is at nine workers and has only a five brood left of the first generation.

 

 

I also noticed something about the brood of my largest colony... there's second generation eggs! I am quite interested to see just how large the second generation will be considering the first generation is 14. I also have a formicarium idea that I have started to buy the parts for. It is basically a 30x200mm glass water injection tube, like that used for bamboo tubes, and it will have a piece of oak inserted into it. I want to use an oak dowel and carve galleries into it for one and for the other I want to put a piece of oak branch that has been beetled and termited. I do have a concern that it will just be a big moldy mess, especially once I put ants into it, so I am considering putting a colony of springtails into them when I do eventually make them. These formicaria could possibly fit a fully mature colony if they really do only reach around 300 workers. Though to achieve this there will most definitely be chambers that are unviewable.

Edited by ReignofRage, January 21 2022 - 1:01 AM.

[ReignofRage]

Not an update, but I have acquired a C. modoc queen from last season. 

 

[ReignofRage]

Update June 17th 2022

 

The C. festinatus ended up dying unfortunately and the C. modoc queen was indeed a dud that died.

 

 

C. ocreatus - This colony was doing good and peaked at 65 or so workers, but has since stalled out due to around a month ago not being able to feed them for a couple weeks and there has been no increase in amount of brood since - luckily the workers aren't dying fast by any means. 

 

 

 

C. sp. cf semitestaceus 1 - I eventually did put this colony into diapause which it is finally starting to develop again. The larvae have started to grow a bit and the queen has gotten more physogastric than ever before which makes me hopefully.

 

 

 

C. sp. cf semitestaceus 2 - This colony originated from Jeff and I got it from someone who got it from him. They have been doing well, but they are still small and there isn't much to say about them. 

 

 

 

C. yogi - All my colonies suffered the same as the C. ocreatus during the period I could not feed them for a couple weeks. I'm either going to just start over this year or hope that putting them through diapause will change something later this year.