9 replies to this topic

[CoolColJ]

1. Location of collection - my backyard
2. Date of collection - 29th March 2018
3. Habitat of collection - typical backyard
4. Length - about 6mm
5. Coloration - orange
Slender in appearance
 
She was wandering around on the ground
My first thought was ant queen, so I captured her.
 
She is in the test tube and she is just standing there .
 
But upon looking at the photos, she looks like something else?
 
 

 

[T.C.]

Male.

[CoolColJ]

Male.

thanks, that means I missed the queens

Might be a Phediole male, I've been waiting for the Pheidole to fly all month

Edited by CoolColJ, March 28 2018 - 5:25 PM.

[YsTheAnt]

Male.

thanks, that means I missed the queens

Might be a Phediole male, I've been waiting for the Pheidole to fly all month

Males often fly before females for a few days. Look at night and during the day, I'm sure you will find something.

[CoolColJ]

Male.

thanks, that means I missed the queens

Might be a Phediole male, I've been waiting for the Pheidole to fly all month

Males often fly before females for a few days. Look at night and during the day, I'm sure you will find something.

Actually I think these males are just Pheidole males wandering outside their nest pre flight day.
When I went back to the spot I found this one, to release it, there was a Pheidole nest where he was wandering around.

A metre away I found another male that just popped out of a nest, and then disappeared back into the nest.

[CoolColJ]

LOL, I was about to leave work in my car and turned the wipers on, and saw a queen ant on my screen, I franticly got out ( I keep queen capture vials in my car for such occasions!) and try to cpature it, but she ran into the crack of the screen trim. I also saw a male there and a bunch of wings

So I blew into the crack and eventually flushed her out - bag one Pheidole queen - the all red ones

There were a ton of wings on my car bonnet actually! I looked around for more but they were long gone.

I also saw magpies around so, that kinda clued me in.

Also when I arrived at 5:30am, I looked around under lights etc, and no sign of them.
So between 6 and 7am they flew, so most likely around dawn


Hmm, but no activity in my backyard, but I did see some males wandering around yesterday. So maybe soon. Still waiting of the black Pheidole species to start flying

[CoolColJ]

Just to be sure, this is a Pheidole queen right? She had one of the males above, with her on my car windscreen, along with some removed wings

About 7.5mm in length
 

Edited by CoolColJ, March 29 2018 - 11:59 PM.

[LC3]

Looks like it.

[TennesseeAnts]

Yes it is a queen!

[Phoenix]

Yep, that's definitely a Pheidole queen.