41 replies to this topic

[Wegmier]

Update #0: C. turkestanus fedtschenkoi introduction

Camponotus turkestanus (this species turns out to be C. fedtschenkoi instead) is a beautiful black-and-yellow coloured ant species from Central-Asia. It is native to the desert-steppes of countries like Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan etc. Interesting about this species is that its workers (and especially the queens!) can vary highly in coloration.

I purchased this colony a year ago. The queen arrived on July 6, 2019. The colony has had its ups and downs, but they are doing well currently.

Unlike my Lasius niger journal on this forum, I won't be posting a years worth of old updates. I'll give a short timeline of the colony and then start posting updates here regularly!

(Image by Mierwinkel)

[July 6 2019] The colony arrived on July 6, 2019. The queen had 4 workers, 3 pupae and some eggs. I'll be keeping them at a temperature between 23-29°C.

[August 2019] One or two workers may have escaped. I discovered a turkestanus fedtschenkoi worker walking over my desk one day! Apparently the talcum barrier was too thick and they could just walk over it. I don't know how many disappeared because of this.

[September 2019] They're doing good and growing steadily. I only check up on them every 3 weeks, I don't want to disturb the queen
 

[October 2019] In two months they've grown from 4 to 16 workers! But now terror struck... They had a large die-off when I gave the colony a heat mat. There probably was a fatal overheating, or maybe the temperature change was too sudden. A lot of dead workers in the outworld. They dropped from 16 workers down to 8...

[November 2019 - March 2020] 
By november the colony had had gained two workers, at 10 workers now. Hibernation started. From november 2019 to march 2020 I kept them in my basement (14 - 15°C). During hibernation two nanitics succumbed, so they were back to 8.

[May 2020]
April was slow, but now they're starting to accept food again.

[June 2020]
One worker died by getting her body stuck in sugarwater. Fortunately the colony is accepting a lot of food

[July 2020]
I decided to check up on them again. They have 18 workers now, back at their former glory! Some of the new workers are big. Finally some media workers have eclosed, they have beautiful pale-yellow bodies and darker heads.
Sadly they lost another three nanitics over the course of this month...  

[August 2020]
I made a small Ytong nest for my turkestanus fedtschenkoi colony. In hindsight the nest is still too large for their colony size. Fortunately they do not seem to litter inside the nest (yet).

Some pictures. Sorry for the low quality. The first few pictures are going to be grainy.
Arrival day:



Sixteen workers, shortly before the great die-off:
 

The Ytong nest I made for them:

 

Inside the new nest:
 

Edited by Wegmier, April 29 2021 - 2:38 AM.

[Devi]

Looks great!  I really like the Ytong nests you built for them.  It adds a nice personal touch.

[Wegmier]

Update 1: Feeding Urea

 

A few days ago I fed urea-water to my turkestanus colony. The mixture consisted of 6% urea (ordered from a webshop) and the rest was water

 

I'm no biologist or ant expert, but I think this is how it works: Urea is a nitrogen-rich chemical notably found in urine.

Camponotus ant species have certain bacteria living inside their gut that can convert urea into helpful amino acids and nutrients. In the wild, camponotus ants have the opportunity to consume urea by digging up bird poop and lizard poop

Some myrmecologists have theorized that it's the lack of urea in captivity that could explain why captive camponotus colonies don't seem to thrive as well as wild colonies, or other captive species

 

Observations:

- Shortly after I fed the colony, a large number of nanitics died. I found five dead workers in the outworld the following days. Perhaps the Urea part was too strong, I'll try a 2-3% mixture next time

- None of the bigger workers died, so it seems to have only been the old workers from last year that perished.

- After a week a large egg-pile appeared among the brood. There's about ~20 eggs in the nest. Maybe this increased fecundity is related to the urea feeding? Who knows

 

I'll probably be feeding urea every 2 months or so

Urea granules


A dead nanitic in the outworld - a clutch of eggs in the nest

Edited by Wegmier, December 14 2020 - 8:28 AM.

[Antkid12]

Awesome journal, these camponotus look pretty cool!

[NickAnter]

They look very similar to the North American semitestaceus.

[BlueLance213]

The colours are so weird! But that makes them even more interesting!

[Wegmier]

Update 2: First Major on the way?! (August 18 2020)

 

The colony seems very healthy. They now have ~25 workers.
There's also ~15 pupae and a fair amount of larvae & eggs. I think they'll reach at least fifty workers by the end of this year (if there aren't any die-offs again).

One pupa is huge! I'm hoping this will be the colony's first major.



Workers tending to the brood & trophallaxis - Workers nibbling on some food
 

Edited by Wegmier, December 24 2020 - 2:13 PM.

[Wegmier]

Update 3: Growth (August 26 2020)

 

The colony is doing great. The ants usually hide in a dark corner of the nest where I cannot see them, but yesterday there was a short moment when (presumably) all the ants & their brood were chilling in the rooms instead of their usual covered tunnel.
I counted 36 workers! More than I expected
 

A full shot of the nest below. The size of the nest shows how much I over-estimated the amount of space they'd need.   (they only had ~19 workers when they moved in)  

Thankfully these camponotus seem to be a very tidy, hygienic species. My Lasius niger colonies would have turned an oversized nest into a trashpile already 



The tube leading from the nest to the outworld is full of sand. The ants built this ramp of sand & trash themselves:
(Heating cable in the background because the temperatures are cooling down here)



 

Edited by Wegmier, December 14 2020 - 8:29 AM.

[Wegmier]

Update 4: First major (September 18 2020)

 

The colony growth rate is really taking off now. My estimate is that they have around 50 workers.

I went on a week long vacation and got a cousin to feed my ants inbetween. Returning home I was greeted by two tiny majors (presumably)! The completely yellow worker will darken over the next few days until her head is black
They are both beautiful.
 

I accidentally watered the nest too much causing a lot of panic and dirt carrying. The ants pasted some of the loamsand to the glass. Clever girls
This does hinder my view a bit and makes counting them more difficult. 

 

They have a very nice brood pile.
At least fifteen pupae, a dozen medium-sized larvae and a large clutch of eggs and tiny larvae.

Edited by Wegmier, March 19 2021 - 8:39 AM.

[Wegmier]

Update 5: Still thriving (October 21 2020)

 

There must be around 80 workers now. They grew at least tenfold this year, as they started with only 8 workers way back in March
 

The colony still has a large amount of brood and the queen is still laying eggs, even though the temperature in my room has already dropped a lot. I'll be getting them ready for hibernation soon. I'm still not sure what the ideal hibernation temperature is for C. turkestanus fedtschenkoi. If anyone knows, please tell me! I'll probably put them in my 16-17℃ basement for four months, like last winter.

The ants have removed most of the sand from the nest and dumped it into their outworld. Full view of the nest:



The populated part:

Edited by Wegmier, March 19 2021 - 8:40 AM.

[RushmoreAnts]

The ants pasted some of the loamsand to the glass. Clever girls. I accidentally watered the nest too much, twice. Causing a lot of panic and dirt carrying.

This does hinder my view a bit and makes counting them more difficult. 

 

 

My Pogonomyrmex colony does this as well; it's a natural response to light.
 

[Wegmier]

Update 6: Winter plans? (November 8 2020)

 

Almost three weeks later. A big pile of pupae has appeared, about 40-50 of them. That's nearly half the current colony size
I saw my queen lay an egg for the first time, they're still not in the mood for hibernation. Sadly was too late to record her laying it

Also had a big revelation. I'd been wondering how large C. turkestanus colonies could become. Doing some reading & from what other people have told me - it turns out my C. turkestanus might not even be turkestanus!
They are most likely a different species called C. fedtschenkoi. Still have to determine them with certainty, but it seems I might have to rename this journal to Camponotus fedtschenkoi instead

Apparently most antkeepers have mixed up these two species because of how similar they look, the fact that they're both native to roughly the same area, and because some popular webshops have labeled them incorrectly.
According to most sources C. turkestanus will max out at a few hundred workers. C. fedtschenkoi on the other hand can grow into the several thousands of workers. So if my colony turns out to be the latter, then that's good news for me! I'd love a huge colony of these yellow ants

The pupa pile:



Top view of the nest:

Edited by Wegmier, February 28 2021 - 4:07 AM.

[Fatboy40]

I'm glad I've come across this thread as I've recently bought a Camponotus Fedtschenkoi queen as well, currently with five workers and two larvae, as I wanted a Camponotus species that has a reduced hibernation requirement. The nanitic workers are very odd little things aren't they, so pale that their legs seem almost invisible on darker substrate.

 

I'm glad to see that if looked after well they'll thrive, and at the moment mine aren't very interested in protein but they're a very small colony. Now you have a bigger colony what sort of activity do you see from them in their outworld?

[Wegmier]

Update 7: Fruitfly bonanza (December 3 2020)

 

Still no hibernation behavior. The queen continues to lay eggs and the larvae are still growing and pupating.

I tried to do a headcount of the workers. There's at least 200 now! They grew from 20 to 200+ over the past five months.
I'm running out of feeder insects because all of my other colonies are in hibernation and I don't want to purchase new ones. Fortunately I managed to save 15 fruitflies and start one last culture. This colony absolutely loves them. Any amount of fruitflies that I throw in there gets devoured

Full view of the nest. They are finally occupying every room: 



Workers tending to the larvae. Pretty how all the larvae have yellow or orange butts. Fruitfly remains between the larvae at the top center:

Edited by Wegmier, December 14 2020 - 8:46 AM.

[Ants_Dakota]

look at the size of those gasters! they look super healthy! i have a small colony of c. novaeboracensis with 16 workers. your colony is exploding, so i wonder if you have any tips for me? thanks!

[Wegmier]

look at the size of those gasters! they look super healthy! i have a small colony of c. novaeboracensis with 16 workers. your colony is exploding, so i wonder if you have any tips for me? thanks!

Those look neat! The colors remind me of my C. ligniperda ants (still in founding stage)

Can't think of any tips sorry, I don't really know if I'm doing something right haha. Just feeding them daily & making sure they always have access to fresh sugars seems to work. You could try feeding urea to your Camponotus urea (Update #1) as well, though I couldn't say for sure if this colony owes their success to that

Edited by Wegmier, December 13 2020 - 11:30 AM.

[Zeiss]

The journal is looking great so far!  I love the ants.

 

On the urea topic.  I've seen plenty of colonies that have done well for many years without additional urea supplements.  I would doubt that their internal gut biome would be killed off over time due to lack of access to excess urea, but it would be interesting to see what the research on the topic finds.  At least you aren't peeing on your Camponotus, haha.

[Wegmier]

Update 8: Rescue Mission! - Secondary colony (December 14 2020)

 

I have a second colony of this species that I haven't talked about on here before. When I received the first colony in July 2019, I was so excited that I bought a second one as a back-up. Fast forward to early 2020 and my secondary colony was still doing nicely. But around May/June, workers started dying off. By July they only had 3 workers and 4 pupae left. For some reason the brood suddenly died. The workers threw all four remaining pupae into the outworld. Then those last 3 workers died one by one. The next 6 months I was hoping the queen would start laying eggs again but she never did. I still gave her sugarwater once a month which she always accepted. She appears to be healthy and is moving actively

 

The rescue:
My main colony is still thriving. They have about 100 pupae and larvae in their nest. I'm going to donate some of their brood to the lone queen.

The struggling queen has a brown-reddish tint to her head and an uncommonly yellow gaster for this species (they usually have black heads and dark brown spots on the gaster). All the more reason I want to save her:



The main colony. Plenty of brood to share with this struggling queen:



By adding a heating cable to the side of their outworld, I got my main colony to start dumping pupae at this new warm spot. I scooped up 9 pupae with a piece of tinfoil:



Left: Prepared a new test tube for the queen (the old one began to mold):
Right: Letting the queen walk into the new tube with the pupae added:
 

Succes!
The queen immediately started carrying around the pupae when she walked into them. Hopefully they succesfully eclose:

Edited by Wegmier, December 14 2020 - 9:00 AM.

[dayglowfroggy]

HI this journal is great just what I needed thanks for sharing .

 

My new Turkestanus Queen Arrived today !

 

It was from Britishants I wanted a camponotus queen ideally that doesn't need  to hibernate for very long or very cold ,I also really liked the idea of a colony that stops around 200 but since discovering there is a hi chance I might have Fedtschenkoi instead and reading  the description on antlady site I am excited if its those as well "the only camponotus that get majors bigger than the queen" though I can't even imagine how anyone can house a large colony of camponotus ,can't find much on the internet about how people do it .

 

So you are about two years ahead of me and fingers crossed mine can rival yours I only have a small colony of pheidole pallidula they are very active and fun to watch but so small that's why a wanted some big ants . 

 

My queen has one worker and one or possibly two brood I plan on leaving her under the red film without touching for 5 days then putting a tiny drop of sun burst a chopped in half wheat weevil and a small chunk of meal worm on tiny plastic tray .

Do you think this sounds like a good idea ?

Its just to give them the option to eat if they need to then leave them alone unless they seem to need anything .

I keep my ants on the windowsill in the downstairs toilet at this time of year so I still keep a good eye on them and its the coolest place in the house though I struggle to keep it down around 15 sometimes{very well insulated house}I still feed the pallidula every other day or so if they come out looking for food but only one chopped wheat weevil they even take food at 15 though most of the colony look asleep .

 

I will be watching your posts with interest .

[Wegmier]

HI this journal is great just what I needed thanks for sharing .

 

My new Turkestanus Queen Arrived today !

 

It was from Britishants I wanted a camponotus queen ideally that doesn't need  to hibernate for very long or very cold ,I also really liked the idea of a colony that stops around 200 but since discovering there is a hi chance I might have Fedtschenkoi instead and reading  the description on antlady site I am excited if its those as well "the only camponotus that get majors bigger than the queen" though I can't even imagine how anyone can house a large colony of camponotus ,can't find much on the internet about how people do it .

 

So you are about two years ahead of me and fingers crossed mine can rival yours I only have a small colony of pheidole pallidula they are very active and fun to watch but so small that's why a wanted some big ants .

 
Exciting, good luck with your colony!
 

My queen has one worker and one or possibly two brood I plan on leaving her under the red film without touching for 5 days then putting a tiny drop of sun burst a chopped in half wheat weevil and a small chunk of meal worm on tiny plastic tray .

Do you think this sounds like a good idea ?

 

Sounds good. I'm not familiar with sunburst but I've heard great things about it. My own colony doesn't seem very interested in mealworms. They'll still inspect and eat some of it, no worries, but imo fruitflies are a much greater food than mealworms if you can get your hands on a culture. Fruitflies make nice food with their higher protein value and soft bodies, great for small colonies
 

I keep my ants on the windowsill in the downstairs toilet at this time of year so I still keep a good eye on them and its the coolest place in the house though I struggle to keep it down around 15 sometimes{very well insulated house}I still feed the pallidula every other day or so if they come out looking for food but only one chopped wheat weevil they even take food at 15 though most of the colony look asleep .

 
If your colony has two pupae now, then I'd personally wait a bit before hibernating them at 15. The pupae need a decent temperature to develop and eclose
Especially if they still accept protein food like you say. I'd put them back at room temperature if I were you, let the pupae eclose, see if the colony develops or not and then reconsider hibernation