I feel like such an idiot. A klutz. I killed my Dorymyrmex queen while changing the tube to their nest. Sometimes I feel like they do much better when I just don't mess with them at all. Every bad thing that's happened has been because I did something. I was trying to connect an additional nest since they have been growing so well, and all of them were on the other side of the little box, but the queen spazed out and ran over to the tube and got hurt.
They have a massive pile of brood. A beautiful outworld that I at last got right. And I murdered their queen. I should be sent to jail. She was such a lovely queen. Kept her wings for three years. I'm going to miss her and I'm devastated that I won't get to see the colony grow.
I'm going to be even MORE careful. But I'm also not going to get paralyzed like I can't do anything with them. Anyone in NYC want a pile of Dorymyrmex bureni brood?
At first I didn't even want to say anything here about this, but that's silly. I wish people would post more here about how things go wrong. The lesson here is that changing nests and tubing is always dangerous to your colony. And I KNOW that. But, yeah. It's the worst part of this hobby how fragile they are and how responsible YOU will always be for what happens to them. I feel like such a monster. Like I shouldn't even be near any ants. Why didn't I find a different way to change that tube? Am I too sensitive? IDK. I really love my ants. I try to be good to them in exchange for the strange way they have to live. I try to be grateful for the things I learn from them and the joy I get from watching them. But maybe that queen would have had a much better life in a sidewalk crack in a quiet corner of the park. Poor girl. Poor colony.
Any recommendations for the queenless colony? They will keep going for months, when my Pogonomyrmex queen died it was a whole year until they were all gone. They even laid male eggs. So many male alates. Then I had to figure out what to do with those boys.
I wonder if the Dorymyrmex will do that.
Edited by futurebird, April 3 2024 - 12:22 PM.