5 replies to this topic

[MichiganAnts]

Species: camponotus pennsylvanicus

 

Location found: In a wood pile near my swamp

 

Age of colony: 1 year old

 

Workers/nanitics: 14

 

Majors: 0

 

**will post more info on the 2nd post, 1st post is just stats about the colony**

 

 

Edited by MichiganAnts, April 6 2017 - 9:33 AM.

[MichiganAnts]

Ah my only colony i've ever brood boosted. A fun fact is everything in that nest except the queen herself was originally belonging to a very large Camponotus colony. I failed in trying to combine them with her since at the time it was thought the queen was dead (she was dead but i didn't know until a few days later). All the workers and even the brood was added to her without incident. I'm glad they are a big happy family, for the first few days the queen would never go in the same chamber as the workers and brood. A couple workers would check on her and feed/clean her, but she stayed alone. But after a couple days she moved in with them and all is well. Since the brood she has came from a 3 year old colony (it had super majors) I'm expecting her to have a couple super majors and a few majors from that brood. She currently has ~100-200 eggs/larvae. 

[MichiganAnts]

small update: tons of pupae and some are close to eclosing. the brood boosting is about to really kick in

[MichiganAnts]

small update:  not alot has changed with these girls. they are about to have a population explosion in the next week or so. currently they have about 2 dozen pupae waiting around. aswell as a fair amount of eggs and larvae.

[MichiganAnts]

new pics!!

 

[MichiganAnts]

Update: 

 

Not really sure what's going on with this colony. Worker production is normal but with ~30 workers they have 0 majors. However i see 1 larvae and 1-2 pupae that may be the first majors. I'm used to Camponotus Nove that tend to get 1-3 sub-majors before hitting 20 workers.