Hello again people of Formiculture! I come again with a very interesting thing I've tried with some of my Novomessor queens and my Pogonomyrmex Rugosus queens! A few months ago I had a Novomessor queen that was getting brood but she kept eating most but had 1 medium sized larva. Knowing that the chances of her succeeding was low I decided to attempt introducing my last surviving Pogonomyrmex Rugosus queen. I dipped her into white vinegar to get the colony scent off of her. I then carefully took her out of the vinegar and dried her off... I then proceeded to remove the Novomessor queen and separate her for the time being so the Rugosus queen could get the Novomessor scent on her. In went the Rugosus queen cautiously touching her surroundings trying to figure out where she was... 15 minutes later I decided to pop the Novomessor queen back in...She slowly started crawling in... And all of the sudden she went into a mad panic! Her nest had been infiltrated by another queen! She dashed around attempting to bite the Pogonomyrmex's queen right off. But little did she know that the queen would not die... She kept chomping away at her head trying to kill her... but she didn't die... The Rugosus queen just stood there... Not wanting to fight... She just took the blows... The Novomessor queen then realized there was no way she'd be able to kill the queen... They then were put away for the night to get used to eachother... The next day I came to check up on them and that's where I was shocked. The Novomessor queen was able to chomp of one of the Rugosus queen's legs! But no more further damage was done... The Novomessor queen only attacked when the Rugosus queen got too close to her side of the tube. Fast forward 1 month I was about to leave for a trip to Michigan when I noticed the Rugosus queen's back leg was injured. I saw that she struggled to move around... So I had only one option for this to work out in the end well... I took out the Rugosus queen and put her in a separate tube so I didn't have to kill her because I didn't have the heart or courage to kill that queen. I then took a new Pogonomyrmex Rugosus queen and dipped her in white vinegar and put her in with the Novomessor queen along with 1 Novomessor pupa. 3 weeks later I come back to see that this time the Rugosus queen had her whole leg severed but could walk around fine. And then I saw the thing that almost 100% guaranteed success. The pupa I gave them had become an adult worker! Now, the interesting thing is that the worker cares for both queens, but when the queens come in contact the worker just sits back and lets the Novomessor queen throw the punches! So this a case of Oligyny! The worker never forages for some reason which leads me to believe that if the Rugosus queen gets workers soon the Pogonomyrmex will do most of the work for foraging while the Novomessor will stay in the nest to care for brood! I'm fascinated by Multi species colonies and I really hope this colony keeps growing and that we soon get Rugosus workers! I'll keep you all posted!
Pics are coming later!
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