68 replies to this topic

[NickAnter]

The aphidicola queen got a worker! They also have over 100 larvae, and 15 pupae left (the workers mangled a couple pupae).

I'm so happy to have gotten this queen to workers. Most definitely the most rewarding species I have ever raised to workers, the entire process was fascinating, and I was able to truly widen my horizons when it comes to antkeeping. I hope to be able to try to raise more parasitic species of different genera later on as well.

 

The First Acanthomyops, as she shall now be called, has 14 pupae, with around 30 larvae left to go, along with a couple eggs. I underestimated a bit in the last post. And it was only that first pupa that was a bit small, the others seem to be quite normal. The other larvae are growing very rapidly, so I hope to be able to move them into a lair soon. The cotton in their test tube is black now

 

I'll try to get some pics of the Acanthomyops in the next update.

 

The Poor Queen is absolutely crushing it. She has around 70 eggs, and now some larvae. She'll probably get workers eventually.

 

The pairs are just doing kind of meh. They each have a couple larvae, and some eggs. One had a large die-off of host workers, despite me not neglecting them.

 

The Second Queen is doing quite well. She has probably around 30 small larvae, though it is hard to tell since they are on the cotton, and are almost never moved anywhere else.

Edited by NickAnter, March 14 2022 - 9:23 PM.

[ANTdrew]

Awesome!

[NicholasP]

The aphidicola queen got a worker! They also have over 100 larvae, and 15 pupae left (the workers mangled a couple pupae).

I'm so happy to have gotten this queen to workers. Most definitely the most rewarding species I have ever raised to workers, the entire process was fascinating, and I was able to truly widen my horizons when it comes to antkeeping. I hope to be able to try to raise more parasitic species of different genera later on as well.

 

The First Acanthomyops, as she shall now be called, has 14 pupae, with around 30 larvae left to go, along with a couple eggs. I underestimated a bit in the last post. And it was only that first pupa that was a bit small, the others seem to be quite normal. The other larvae are growing very rapidly, so I hope to be able to move them into a lair soon. The cotton in their test tube is black now

 

I'll try to get some pics of the Acanthomyops in the next update.

 

The Poor Queen is absolutely crushing it. She has around 70 eggs, and now some larvae. She'll probably get workers eventually.

 

The pairs are just doing kind of meh. They each have a couple larvae, and some eggs. One had a large die-off of host workers, despite me not neglecting them.

 

The Second Queen is doing quite well. She has probably around 30 small larvae, though it is hard to tell since they are on the cotton, and are almost never moved anywhere else.

Remember to keep in mind the first born Biological worker and possibly some more will die at first when getting unraveled from the cocoon because for some reason hosts for acanthomyops do that.

[ANTdrew]

I don’t think there’s any reason to assume that. He has a photo of the healthy firstborn up above in any case.

[ColAnt735]

The aphidicola queen got a worker! They also have over 100 larvae, and 15 pupae left (the workers mangled a couple pupae).

I'm so happy to have gotten this queen to workers. Most definitely the most rewarding species I have ever raised to workers, the entire process was fascinating, and I was able to truly widen my horizons when it comes to antkeeping. I hope to be able to try to raise more parasitic species of different genera later on as well.

 

The First Acanthomyops, as she shall now be called, has 14 pupae, with around 30 larvae left to go, along with a couple eggs. I underestimated a bit in the last post. And it was only that first pupa that was a bit small, the others seem to be quite normal. The other larvae are growing very rapidly, so I hope to be able to move them into a lair soon. The cotton in their test tube is black now

 

I'll try to get some pics of the Acanthomyops in the next update.

 

The Poor Queen is absolutely crushing it. She has around 70 eggs, and now some larvae. She'll probably get workers eventually.

 

The pairs are just doing kind of meh. They each have a couple larvae, and some eggs. One had a large die-off of host workers, despite me not neglecting them.

 

The Second Queen is doing quite well. She has probably around 30 small larvae, though it is hard to tell since they are on the cotton, and are almost never moved anywhere else.

Congrats!

[Antkeeper01]

I don’t think there’s any reason to assume that. He has a photo of the healthy firstborn up above in any case.

I know several people who have had their first acanthomyops bio get killed/die but the rest do well

[NickAnter]

I think that NicholasP was talking about the Acanthomyops queens who have yet to get workers, since aphidicola aren't in that subgenus.

 

The aphidicola worker is alive and well, and already full of food. It's quite cool how transparent her gaster is, and she is running around like all Lasius love to do.

 

I'm just going to hope that it happens with none of them. If anything, I have noticed that I had far better luck with parasitic queen-host interactions among Acanthomyops than Chthonolasius. The Chthonolasius are also far less equipped at dealing with unruly hosts than the Acanthomyops.

[NicholasP]

I think that NicholasP was talking about the Acanthomyops queens who have yet to get workers, since aphidicola aren't in that subgenus.

 

The aphidicola worker is alive and well, and already full of food. It's quite cool how transparent her gaster is, and she is running around like all Lasius love to do.

 

I'm just going to hope that it happens with none of them. If anything, I have noticed that I had far better luck with parasitic queen-host interactions among Acanthomyops than Chthonolasius. The Chthonolasius are also far less equipped at dealing with unruly hosts than the Acanthomyops.

Yeah, I was talking about the Acanthomyops. Congrats on the aphidicola though! They're one of my favorite Cthonolasius species. Also, about the Cthonolasius being less equipped at dealing with aggressive hosts... That is absolutely true. When I was in Michigan a few months ago and caught a lasius aphidicola queen under a log I wanted to experiment before I left to see how well aphidicola queens are with hosts and to my dismay they are not great. The thorax, gaster, and head are armored enough to withstand attacks, but the legs unfortunately aren't as well armored. One crazy worker went in and attacked the queen's leg and stayed attached on the leg for 2 days until the queen died. Good job with your worker host introduction for your Aphidicola though!

Edited by NicholasP, March 15 2022 - 4:05 PM.

[RushmoreAnts]

 

The aphidicola queen got a worker! They also have over 100 larvae, and 15 pupae left (the workers mangled a couple pupae).

I'm so happy to have gotten this queen to workers. Most definitely the most rewarding species I have ever raised to workers, the entire process was fascinating, and I was able to truly widen my horizons when it comes to antkeeping. I hope to be able to try to raise more parasitic species of different genera later on as well.

 

The First Acanthomyops, as she shall now be called, has 14 pupae, with around 30 larvae left to go, along with a couple eggs. I underestimated a bit in the last post. And it was only that first pupa that was a bit small, the others seem to be quite normal. The other larvae are growing very rapidly, so I hope to be able to move them into a lair soon. The cotton in their test tube is black now

 

I'll try to get some pics of the Acanthomyops in the next update.

 

The Poor Queen is absolutely crushing it. She has around 70 eggs, and now some larvae. She'll probably get workers eventually.

 

The pairs are just doing kind of meh. They each have a couple larvae, and some eggs. One had a large die-off of host workers, despite me not neglecting them.

 

The Second Queen is doing quite well. She has probably around 30 small larvae, though it is hard to tell since they are on the cotton, and are almost never moved anywhere else.

Remember to keep in mind the first born Biological worker and possibly some more will die at first when getting unraveled from the cocoon because for some reason hosts for acanthomyops do that.

 

"Some reason" is most likely due to physiological & pheromonal differences between two species, which the hosts can still recognize somewhat despite acceptation on occasion. However yes, with Acanthomyops, it is likely this will not happen, although it is possible.

Edited by AntsDakota, March 15 2022 - 7:59 PM.

[NickAnter]

They had a second worker eclose. Sadly dead. I do not think the hosts killed it, unless they simply didn't take it out in time. It appeared fully darkened, and a bit smaller than the healthy bio worker. The workers seemed to be trying to resuscitate it, hence why I do not think they killed it purposefully. Hopefully the next workers eclose just fine.

[azzaaazzzz00]

They'll start eclosing normally pretty soon.

[NickAnter]

Last night, 3 workers eclosed normally.  Sadly, the larvae have been eating themselves, so there are less larvae now. I'm not sure what their problem is, since all the larvae were clearly full of food. Anyway, I gave them more food, and there are a couple larvae that should pupate fairly soon. I can't wait until I see some aphidicola workers actually foraging in the outworld.

[ANTdrew]

Well, they are parasites after all…

[NickAnter]

The Acanthomyops got a worker! And then it died! The stupid, useless, good for nothing, idiotic, moronic, imbecilic, lazy, feckless, stupid, dimwitted and uncaring(I'm proud of that insult chain) hosts let the first two workers die. They didn't eclose them from the pupae soon enough, so they came out poorly, and got eaten by the larvae the next day. They still have a decent amount of larvae and pupae, and the queen laid a bunch more eggs. Hopefully they can manage to eclose the next workers.

 

The aphidicola are doing great. The biological workers have no problem going out and about foraging, which is pretty cool, since for some reason I imagined they would be more nocturnal. Thankfully that isn't the case. Sadly, most of their larvae got eaten/ate each other, so they have like 16 pupae and like 30 larvae.

Enjoy a nice video of part of the colony:

[azzaaazzzz00]

It was sad until I accidental bit my tongue reading those insults...

[ANTdrew]

So how do you really feel about those host workers? Lol

Edited by ANTdrew, April 4 2022 - 2:21 PM.

[ZTYguy]

Do you want to talk about it? Lmao

[DDD101DDD]

They seem like way more trouble than they're worth.

[azzaaazzzz00]

Imagine the colony dies because the idiotic hosts can't help a worker eclose properly, let's hope that doesn't happen

[NicholasP]

For your Acanthomyops did you use hosts workers from multiple colonies?