14 replies to this topic

[sweetgrass]

I need to have my brain examined.  Spent about 28 hr extracting ants and larvae from a piece of wood.  I got a queen, a winged ant, large workers, medium workers and larvae.  Squished some ants and larvae unfortunately.  Used a hammer and a splitter, then a nut pick, the splitter alone, a pruning saw, tree pruners, buck saw, steel saw.  Used a piece of paper and got ant to attack it, transferred to a pill bottle and then chased it around with a test tube to get it inside the test tube.  Had to wait until the other ants not near the end.  OMG  I had lots of fun.  Had a few escapes - ants running everywhere with me covering them up with pill bottles, test tubes, lids, etc.  Took forever.  Had to chill them sometimes to get them into a test tube with others.  Added the tube to the portal every night.  Got the last single ant out this morning.  Then I tested an ant I got from another log as they looked the same - and someone said they could be a satellite colony as no queen.  There was no fighting - so this afternoon I added the ants in that portal to the other portal.  Lots more chilling and waiting for an opening in the portal holes.  I have my first real colony.  There is a huge pile of larvae that I extracted.  They have been thru a lot of pounding and hammering and shifting around but are calm.  Workers pulling cotton around, others eating the canned cat food, mutual grooming and feeding.    Should I move them into something else? What if i should?  I am tired out but happy.

 

Since adding the winged princess?? yesterday afternoon she has never joined the huge pile of ants, queen and larvae - always stayed either in the portal or the other tube that was there until this evening.  I carefully touched the larvae with a toothpick until they stuck to it.  Sometimes I just had one egg that I added to the queen tube, sometimes I had a clump.  It was so cute watching them discover the 'errant larvae' and pick them up and run to the larvae pile!!  I even moved one larvae from the satellite colony that may have been laid by a gamergate - unfortunately I squished the other one.  I am pro now at extracting ants and larvae lol

[Trythis22]

I'm sorry, you spent 28 hours moving ants from a log to paper to test tube? Not 2.8? I must be hallucinating, misunderstanding or not reading something correctly. 

 

Good news you were able to safely extract all the important parts. That sure looks like a lot of work for one colony - Camponotus species seem to be among the most popular to keep as pets so congratulations on the find. 

 

Best of luck to you and this colony.

[sweetgrass]

Yes it took me 28 hr or more over 3 or 4 days.  The wood was hard to work with.  Had to stop after a few hammers to check for ants that came out and didn't want to continue and squish any!!

[DaveJay]

Well done! That's an impressive colony!
I found some small founding colonies of a Melophorus species that are just waking up after winter (they're small, fast ants that love the heat) and with one was lucky enough to see the Queen milling around with the workers so I snagged her and a couple of workers one day, the next day I went back and dug the rest of the colony up. I was on hands and knees in a public car park for nearly an hour sorting through dirt teaspoon by teaspoon, catching workers one by one. The weekend before last I found another colony but by then the dirt was too hard so I came back with a little spade and took the whole nest out in one spadefull of dirt and put it in a bucket to sort at home, I now am the proud owner of a bucket of dirt that I feed! Hopefully you've shamed me into pulling my finger out and start sorting!

[sweetgrass]

Well DaveJay you and I both are candidates for the white jackets!!  LOL.  I can just see you out there in the car park  OMG  Feeding a bucket of dirt YAY.  You must start sorting the dirt!!  I want to see pictures.  Hard work - mine were large - teeny ones must be crazy to catch without hurting them.  I hated when I accidentally hurt or killed any.  

[brianhershey]

I've extracted 4 colonies from 4 small logs this year, Crematogaster species, lots of ants and brood in each. I tried breaking some apart, I tried heating one, I tried flooding one, turns out after months of work they were ALL satellite nests with no queens OMG. The only Crem queen I have was from a walnut, and it took 2 hours to pick that thing apart to get her out. They are still doing well in a THA ytong nest.

 

Oh the things we do for this hobby lol

[sweetgrass]

A walnut!! You are my hero

[Arcais]

Same thing happened to me with a different camponotus species splitting oak logs for firewood.  Minus the 28 hours.  Mine pretty much plopped out with a few random workers coming later.

[Kalidas]

I am very tempted to try this myself lol. Currently living with my grandparents in Sanata Ana and in the backyard we have a huge pile of wood. Maybe there's something in there.

Great job, nice work you did!

[TennesseeAnts]

What species?

[dspdrew]

I am very tempted to try this myself lol. Currently living with my grandparents in Sanata Ana and in the backyard we have a huge pile of wood. Maybe there's something in there.

Great job, nice work you did!

 

If there is, it's probably a bunch of Argentine ants.

[Arcais]

Mine were Camponotus quercicola

[FSTP]

 

I am very tempted to try this myself lol. Currently living with my grandparents in Sanata Ana and in the backyard we have a huge pile of wood. Maybe there's something in there.

Great job, nice work you did!

 

If there is, it's probably a bunch of Argentine ants.

 

 

 

Yeah it seems in California you very rarely find native ants in living in and around homes. But if you do decide to look, I'd be curious as to what you find.

[YsTheAnt]

Across the street from I house there's a park that has 5+ species of Camponotus, Liometopum occidentale, Aphaenogaster occidentalis, Formica, Prenolepis imparis, tetramorium, and more. It's amazing what a small undisturbed area can have in CA.

Edited by YsTheAnt, October 20 2018 - 9:42 AM.

[sweetgrass]

I posted pics of my camponotus ants I extracted in the ID thread just now.  Would like to know what they are.  Thanks