Today as I was out exploring, I saw a bunch of ants...Solenopsis amblychila, which are really common around here. I also saw some type of Formica sp, usually I see this particular one up in the mountains in wooded areas. They are rusty red colored, with black gasters/heads. Medium sized, and I always see them in Julian down in San Diego (I live in Orange County now). Which is a bit strange to me, as they were nowhere near a wooded area (a pretty dry area actually) and no trees at all around. Maybe it is just a similar looking species. I didn't get any samples, but it looked like I had just missed their mating flight. Or maybe they are getting ready for one. All the workers were all over climbing on everything, but I didn't see any alates.
I saw Dorymyrmex insanus, which are rather common.
And at the end of the walk (I was about to turn around, but decided to go a bit further ahead) I ended up in an area with a large Dorymyrmex bicolor colony. They had small mounds all over, and tons of alates under a rock. Along with a bunch of brood, and a few queens (I think I got 4-5 queens, and this colony had easily over 10) that ended up in my anting container. I didn't want to take everything obviously as that is kind of destroying a nice healthy colony, so I left most of the queens and stuff under the rock.
So, now they are in two containers hooked up with tubing. I'll be taking pictures of them tomorrow. I would today, but I'm way too tired!
Kind of medium sized ants (to me anyway). But, very active and really fast. I'll have to think of a foraging area, as opening the ant farm doesn't seem to work that great like it does for some other ants. Even then, if they are all in the foraging area...they can still all swarm out. Maybe I need to buy ant slippery stuff (name escapes me at moment, bad memory) for these guys. In any case, I put in a bottle cap of honey (like I do for all my ants) with napkin soaked into it and they began eating it right away.
Hope this colony does well. I don't usually keep this particular species. I've seen them around a lot, but I don't recall ever keeping them. They seem a bit rare around here, as usually Forelius pruinosus/mccooki are the dominant ones that I have seen. So, we'll see what happens.
Edited by Vendayn, September 17 2016 - 9:10 PM.