9-13-2014
 
On the evening of 8-27-2014 I found a few of these Lasius sp. dealates up near San Antonio Falls by Mt. Baldy, California. Later that night I found more dealates and alates in Ice House Canyon, just a little ways from there.
 

 

 

 
 
Since this and another Lasius sp. I found up there were obviously parasitic, I immediately started coming up with a plan to get some workers for them. It took a week, but I finally obtained some of what should be Lasius crypticus. I chilled some of these workers and introduced them to a few of the queens. At first they pulled on their legs and acted aggressive toward them, but after a little while, they were all getting along fine.
 

 
 
Another week went by, and I came across a ton of Lasius pupae and workers of a smaller, darker species, along with some workers from a larger yellowish-orange species.
 

 

 

 

 

 
 
I introduced a bunch of these pupae to the queens with the L. crypticus workers, and gave two more queens some of these pupae as well as some callow workers too.
 
After a few days it started to look like the L. crypticus workers just weren't caring for these pupae at all. I left them alone for a while longer, and it looks like some might possibly be taking care of some of the pupae now, but I'm really not sure. In the time that their own sisters helped a whole bunch of them eclose in the tube I had them stored in, not a single one eclosed that was in with the L. crypticus workers.
 
The two queens that I put the pupae and their callow worker sisters in with are getting along with all of them really well, and those workers are obviously taking good care of the brood too. I did notice there were quite a few males eclosing from some of these cocoons, but I managed to pull some of them out.
 

 

 

 
 
I took four more queens and gave them some of the larger, yellowish-orange Lasius sp. workers I found. I chilled them for a bit in the fridge, and when I took them out, a lot of the workers were dead. I added a few more to make up for the dead ones, and eventually they all seemed to be getting along okay with these queens.
 

Update 10-15-2014

 

A bunch of these have died. I still have one of these queens with three Lasius crypticus workers, and two with large amounts of the smaller black Lasius sp. that I found later.
 
I moved all of these into small foraging containers and put them in hibernation a week ago.

Update 1-16-2015
 
I just took these out of hibernation, and two of the queens were dead, leaving just one of the queens with the dark species of Lasius workers. They have a little pile of very small larvae. If I remember right, I think the workers I introduced to her had small larvae with them at the time, so I'm pretty sure that's what these larvae are. I moved the colony into a regular sized foraging container and gave them a liquid feeder with humming bird nectar. I also gave them a small cricket.
 

Update 3-6-2015
 
Well it looks like this queen is most likely fertile. She laid a bunch of eggs a little while ago, and now I can tell they're starting to turn to larvae.
 

 

Update 3-17-2015

 

First they ate all of the new eggs, and now the queen is dead.

I know this is an extremely old thread, but I strongly believe this queen to be lasius coloradensis. The species is known for having very dark queens that often appear to be completely black at first glance, which distinguishes them from other acanthomyops species. If it is indeed coloradensis, this would be the only images of a queen that we know of, alive or dead.

Edited by Manitobant, January 7 2022 - 4:53 PM.

This is the same species in my journal I think.

 

I will do my very best to raise them to workers, so they can be definitively ID.

 

When you are just collecting them outside, they appear very shiny black, but under light in captivity, they definitely appear less so.

 

They are certainly nowhere near uncommon in the place I found them; they were EVERYWHERE in the days afterward, perhaps it is a locally abundant species.