3 replies to this topic

[AntObserver]

Got this Queen Tetramorium Immigrans last week. I gave her a test tube with a small amount of substrate mix. Couple days later and she build a cute little founding chamber which is perfect. 

After building her chamber she laid a nice batch of eggs.  

Took these pics yesterday and she seems very happy with her setup. I counted 53 eggs laid so that is great. Very impressive batch size. 

[gs5248]

I see similar amounts of eggs in my Tetramorium queens, but never the nananitic force to match. I'm not sure if this is a stupid question, but (besides queens eating their eggs from stress) do eggs have a mortality rate?

[Ernteameise]

Are some of these eggs "trophic" eggs that are eaten by other larvae? The queen feeding them to the larvae?  Not sure about this species, but this is what some other species do.

[AntObserver]

The first workers seem to average a lot less so that makes sense.
Aside from the Queen or larvae eating them I don’t believe they have mortality rate as long as they are cared for properly.