16 replies to this topic

[JFowler]

Album: 9/27/2016

7 images

0 comments

 

Hello, everyone; I'm new to this forum and anting/antkeeping. I'm currently browsing prebuilt formicariums and keeping my eyes peeled for queens while I'm out walking. I caught an interesting ant earlier today, and I was hoping you guys could help me identify it.

 

It was caught in my front yard, in Statesboro, Georgia, on 9/27/2016.

I caught her in a small, sandy area next to my cracked concrete driveway. There are trees and lots of leaf litter on the other side of the driveway, but the side she was on was somewhat barren (sand, dead leaves, some grass, acorns everywhere).

I don't have a ruler, but the images I've taken of her have her test tube directly on top of my keyboard; I hope this helps with judging her size. She's a little larger than the smallest Solenopsis Invicta/fire ant workers I have elsewhere in my yard.

She's a dull rust color with a completely smooth-looking exoskeleton. Her eyes are small and black; they're directly behind her mandibles, which are shaped like two interlocking Js. Her gaster is almost completely round, and it looks like she has wing scars on her thorax.

I didn't see any other ants that looked similar to her. There were some skinny, fast orange ants with small, orange-yellow, sandy nest holes nearby, and some scattered tiny black ants coming out of holes with grey piles around them. I also caught one ant that looked like a Pheidole major, with a head much larger than its gaster (the entire ant was a little smaller than the one I'm asking about); whatever it was, it played dead until I released it.

I've given her a little sugar water, and she seems to be enjoying it. She lost one of her antennae while I was capturing her, I think, but she doesn't appear to be dying. She's been very still ever since I got her into a tube, though.

 

I've linked an album that includes my pictures of her and where I caught her. I would've attached the pictures directly to this thread, but I'm not "permitted to upload this kind of file", apparently.

Edited by JFowler, September 27 2016 - 3:38 PM.

[drtrmiller]

Looks like Trachymyrmex, a fungus grower. Good luck!

[dspdrew]

You should not "attach" pictures to a forum thread. Posting them in the thread is the proper way to do it. I think that might be Trachymyrmex.

[Canadian anter]

Looks like an attine but @drtmiller@dspdrew why not cryphomyrmex

[dspdrew]

 

 

 

 

 

 

[dspdrew]

Looks like an attine but @drtmiller@dspdrew why not cryphomyrmex

 

Oh I didn't read the description close enough. If it's smaller than the smallest S. invicta workers he's seen, then yeah it's probably Cyphomyrmex.

[JFowler]

I have a few more pictures, but I can't add them to this post. I'll put them in the album.

Based on antwiki.org's distribution maps, the only Trachymyrmex in my area is septentrionalis. She does have a pair of tiny spikes above her frontmost legs, plus similar mandibles and that head shape. Her abdomen also has the dark vertical stripe I can see on the workers in this video  . I can't see more spikes past the first two, but I do see what looks like white/black irregular bits near the rear of the top of her thorax (I'm hoping those are wing scars).

@dspdrew She's larger than most S. Invicta workers, perhaps slightly smaller than Invicta majors.

I may be in over my head if she actually survives and happens to be a fertile queen. Can this species survive without its fungus? What advice do you all have about keeping this species?

 

A little off-topic: there should be rain in my area tomorrow, and it's still very warm out (80+ degrees every day). What sort of queens should I be on the lookout for?

Edited by JFowler, September 27 2016 - 7:01 PM.

[dspdrew]

I have a few more pictures, but I can't add them to this post. I'll put them in the album.

 

Why can't you add them to this post?

[JFowler]

 

I have a few more pictures, but I can't add them to this post. I'll put them in the album.

 

Why can't you add them to this post?

 

"You aren't permitted to upload this kind of file."

I've tried uploading pictures directly from my phone and my computer. I just tried one again with a different file extension (.png instead of .jpg). No luck. It wasn't over the maximum single file size.

[kellakk]

How did you upload those 7 images to your gallery? If you upload images to your gallery, you can then attach those images to any post you make. See here and here if you get lost.

 

That looks a lot like a Trachymyrmex septentrionalis queen to me, but some more photos would be useful. I'm jealous! I just found a colony of these the other day after searching fruitlessly for them the past few months. Now I just have to wait until next summer for them to fly

[dspdrew]

You CANNOT "attach" image files. They need to be uploaded to the gallery or another image host.

 

I think I am going to remove the option to attach any file at all.

[dspdrew]

http://www.formicult...e-walk-through/

 

http://www.formicult...-photos/?p=7462

[kellakk]

You CANNOT "attach" image files. They need to be uploaded to the gallery or another image host.

 

I think I am going to remove the option to attach any file at all.

 

Oh, right. My wording was probably confusing since I forgot you can even "attach" a file to a post.  Might as well remove that option, it's pretty much useless.

 

http://www.formicult...e-walk-through/

 

http://www.formicult...-photos/?p=7462

 

Didn't I just link both of these posts above? 

[dspdrew]

Didn't I just link both of these posts above? 

 

Yeah. I was about to post them five more times.

[spider_creations]

These queens always reminded me of smaller versions of Acromyrmex vericolor

[Annexis]

I know this is a  bit late for this, but its most definitely Cyphomyrmex. 

[Batspiderfish]

Too bad there isn't a measurement to refer to, but you can at least tell by the eye placement that it isn't Cyphomyrmex (whose eyes are midway up the head).

Edited by Batspiderfish, December 4 2016 - 1:39 PM.