145 replies to this topic

[OhNoNotAgain]

2020.11.23

Well so much for that. The only nanitic (adopted, at that) for Lame Queen has died - a few days after she killed that other worker. So I suspect injuries from that fight did her in.

Now Lame Queen is pretty much ... toast ... with her bum leg and poor parenting skills.

 

With nothing else to do, I have now introduced some of the Large Crew orphans to Lame Queen's mini-hearth.

Last I checked (been busy) Lame Queen was super fidgety and there was a worker trying to steal the brood, but not sure where to take it.

 

UPDATE: Checked on her a bit ago.

A few workers have moved into the nest. They've stolen the brood and moved it to a warmer corner. One worker is hanging out near the queen.

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, November 23 2020 - 7:42 PM.

[OhNoNotAgain]

2020.11.24 

Quick update on the Lame Queen:

Today I found the new workers clustered AROUND the queen, with the brood back with her.

I just dumped in the other half of Large Crew. We'll see what happens!!

 

This merger might be working?! Unless she dies for no apparent reason just like the other queens....

[MinigunL5]

picture pls

[OhNoNotAgain]

picture pls

 

Ummm okay.

 

2 pics of Lame Queen with the much bigger worker crew (12-13, all orphans, maybe from two queens) that seems to have adopted her now that her one other adopted worker is dead.

Notes:

The glass is foggy because of a water oops earlier.

I think I saw a pupa later!!! Which means the biggest larva, stolen from Good Queen, might be pupating?!

 

 

 

Here are 2 pics of Good Queen's group with her natural brood (minus the larva I stole), including the guarded pupae pile.

They moved much of the big pile of red sand off the nest floor and onto the water tower.

 

(Speaking of which, Lame Queen's lone adopted nanitic had been busily moving sand around. It was really cool to watch her grab sand bits with her front legs and shove them against her gaster to make a little clump. Too bad she died before I could take video of it.)

 

 

Oh and dud queen seems to be guarding the one orphan pupa. Um dunno what'll happen with her. If she's actually infertile it won't be very fun for them.

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, November 24 2020 - 11:25 PM.

[OhNoNotAgain]

Oh, today I caught one of the new adopted workers collecting sand. I like how they do it, shoving it against their gasters, which act as a backstop. Anyway sorry for shaky camera.

 

https://youtu.be/t8kkJmIU-50

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, November 25 2020 - 9:46 AM.

[OhNoNotAgain]

2020.11.26 Not Dead Yet....

So Lame Queen's water nestmate in the mini-hearth keeps leaking (probably because they've packed sand against it). Last night I put in water and got a tiny flood and all the ants ran off the water tower. So weird thing: Lame queen has never been perky at the best of times. But I found her tipped off the water tower, face down, unmoving. I mean her face was in a brood pile and her antennae weren't even twitching or anything. She looked pretty dead. I checked other Good Queen and Good Queen was still hanging on the ceiling, looking awake and active. I was freaking a bit and opened the glass and poked at the dead-looking Lame Queen, and she kind of started awake. I guess the water caught her while she was deeply asleep, and she moved off the tower and fell asleep again face down.... Earlier today she was alive, so hopefully she'll stay that way. I mean she has 13 new workers to care for her, so srsly, come on Lame Queen. Get with the program.

 

And speaking of which, Dud Queen now has a nanitic, one of the orphans I bet. At first I thought it might be a survivor of the Dud Queen killing spree, because she had red Perky Pet in her gaster (I don't use Perky Pet but the seller does), but I realized later Dud Queen probably fed the nanitic. I dunno what's going to happen with them. I don't see any brood at all with Dud Queen. But she seemed happy to have a nanitic with her. Yes, I know that is blatant anthropomorphizing but oh well.

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, November 26 2020 - 7:16 PM.

[OhNoNotAgain]

2020.12.10

 

After being laid low by a low grade but annoying migraine, I checked on the honeypots today and... drumroll... yup, they hate me.

Lame Queen was reduced to a gaster by itself in the middle of the nest.  Which is not what a queen's gaster should be doing. And Dud Queen died earlier.

 

So I'm down to ... 1.

Good queen is still alive. In fact there are what looks like three workers on the ceiling acting as mini-repletes.

I fed them some cooked fruit flies today. I'm not sure they have totally figured out the byFormica feeder and should give them an alternative feeder.

 

Yeah I dunno. Everyone else is doing okay, just the pots really truly hate me.

[OhNoNotAgain]

BTW here is the surviving honeypot colony with three replete-wannabes (notice the three on the ceiling). I understand these are not full-blown repletes yet.

By the way, I did give them a different feeder (a THA feeder) and they seem kinda excited about it.

 

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, December 13 2020 - 7:20 PM.

[OhNoNotAgain]

Video of the mini-repletes ... they look a little precarious ... they don't seem too sure about sticking themselves in place and acting like static refrigerators.

 

 

Interesting configuration of workers feeding the larvae. (I gave them cooked fruit flies yesterday)

Looks like the workers are all on the wall, head down, feeding larvae on the watertower (or being fed by larvae??).

 

 

The pupae are kept over by themselves at the other end, with a couple guards:

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, December 21 2020 - 8:30 PM.

[OhNoNotAgain]

2021/1/15

 

M. mexicanus:

 

Orphan update: I bought a discount slow, underperforming queen a couple days ago. She has 1 nanitic and 3 sickly pupae. Today I dumped her into the orphan mini-hearth, but I had recently tried to clean it and it smelled GROSS, plus she was just hiding in a corner of the outworld, so then I dumped ALL the orphans and the queen and her worker into a different mini-hearth. Here's a picture of the queen (notice the small gaster) with some workers nearby soon after dumping. The big healthy pupa near her is an orphan pupa. Still later, I forcibly moved her into the nest since she was all by herself. Last I checked, she is hiding on the ceiling while the orphan workers take care of orphan brood. No one seems interested in the new queen's pupae so I'm not sure if they're alive or not.

 

 

 

Normal queen update: So in previous entries I showed what I thought were "pre-repletes." But today, after not looking for a while, I checked on them and was surprised to see these big, full, replete gasters. So I guess either they got some new repletes or the old mini-repletes really were repletes in the 2ndish or 3rdish brood batch. I fed them cut up cooked mealworm and they treated the pieces as garbage, not food.

 

 

 

Prenos: Poor queens. Huddled and hungry. And MITES, still, despite all my efforts to get rid of the mites.

 

Lios:

They have that funny habit of moving the brood up into the outworld during sunset, when sunlight hits the mini-hearth and warms the outworld. They put the brood into a bottle cap containing leftover food carapaces. Once the temp drops after the sunlight moves on, they empty the cap and haul them down again.

 

 

 

 

[ANTdrew]

My Crematogaster frequently move their brood up and down like you’re describing. They bring the brood up by mid-morning and take it down by evening.

[OhNoNotAgain]

2021/1/16

 

I forgot to mention I cranked up the heating mat thermostat for the new queen, to the low 90's, to help get her feeling better. (This also means that Good Queen's mini-hearth is getting a bit more heat and all the pupae are now in the heated corner.) Since they rejected the mealworm I also gave them a half-formed fly pupa, but not sure if they decided it was edible or not.

 

Anyway this morning, the queen was down near the brood and had the Large orphan Crew around her. Yay. Her gaster also looks a little bit bigger, which is good ... that photo of her from when I dumped her shows how emaciated she was. I'm not sure they ever figured out the fly pupa was edible. I should try to get them some cooked fruit flies, assuming I have any. I know they know fruit flies are food.

 

Now, last time I merged this orphan crew with a queen (Lame Queen), she lived almost a couple weeks and then just keeled over dead for no apparent reason. The orphan crew has been busy raising her brood - at this point, the workers in this colony may be from up to 3? 4? different queens! The original dead queen that wasn't mine (remember these workers came to me orphaned), Good Queen's kidnapped brood (I kidnapped them), Lame queen's own brood, this New Queen's worker, and ... I would have to go back and read this journal carefully to figure out because I can't remember, but I think I put in some other orphan brood or something. Anyway, what a bizarre little colony!

 

The other good news is New Queen's worker hasn't shown up as a corpse as far as I can see, so it seems she's getting along okay.

Yet more evidence of just how much orphaned Myrmecocystus mexicanus are accepting of mergers. I'm surprised the queen's nanitic has been okay with it, unlike Lame Queen's adopted nanitic.

Maybe it helps I dumped ALL of them into a new place.

 

Here's a crappy it's-dark-and-the-glass-isn't-museum-glass photo, just to show the slightly larger gaster and how she's moved to near the water tower and the brood.

 

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, January 16 2021 - 10:49 PM.

[Vendayn]

Your myrmecocystus pictures are really amazing Always love seeing them upside down and filled up.

[OhNoNotAgain]

2021/1/18

Caught my first Cali queen ... a Preno hahahahaha.
I had seen a couple males literally hanging around, and then some minutes later: “Look, what’s that?” A queen. Lol

She is in a mini-hearth away from the poor starving Preno foursome.

The new pot queen is getting nicely plump.

[OhNoNotAgain]

2021/1/21

 

Ah, this is proper M. mexicanus queen gaster. Her adopted workers (and presumably her biological worker) are feeding her well.

 

 

 

And here's a pic of the other bubble butt queen and her bubble butt repletes.

 

 

If only my Prenos would feed themselves they too could have fat gasters. 

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, January 21 2021 - 5:31 PM.

[OhNoNotAgain]

2021/2/1 

 

So I just checked on the pots (yesterday or the day before I refilled their water cuz it was empty - oops) and 

Good Queen is SHRUNKEN. Her gaster is positively tiny. I'm shocked how small she's gotten. As someone on AAK put it, it's either good or bad. Either there are enough repletes so they don't have to shove stuff into the queen any more (as per Nurbs) or else she's sick. I did notice the sugar water dispenser mesh is getting moldy because they had put too much trash near it, so I cleaned it out. I count around 20-some workers+repletes.

 

Adopted Queen is BLOATED. There's one tiny replete-wanna be near her but no actual repletes because, after all, it's a motley group of orphan workers.

 

I haven't gotten a photo, but the gaster of the Adopted Queen above in the "before" shot is about what Good Queen is down to

Edited by OhNoNotAgain, February 1 2021 - 11:03 AM.

[Cephalotus]

2021/2/1 

 

So I just checked on the pots (yesterday or the day before I refilled their water cuz it was empty - oops) and 

Good Queen is SHRUNKEN. Her gaster is positively tiny. I'm shocked how small she's gotten. As someone on AAK put it, it's either good or bad. Either there are enough repletes so they don't have to shove stuff into the queen any more (as per Nurbs) or else she's sick. I did notice the sugar water dispenser mesh is getting moldy because they had put too much trash near it, so I cleaned it out. I count around 20-some workers+repletes.

 

Adopted Queen is BLOATED. There's one tiny replete-wanna be near her but no actual repletes because, after all, it's a motley group of orphan workers.

 

I haven't gotten a photo, but the gaster of the Adopted Queen above in the "before" shot is about what Good Queen is down to

 

I'd almost definitely say that's a good thing. The sooner she stops acting as a replete, the better. If she has her own repletes to take on that duty, I wouldn't be alarmed.

[OhNoNotAgain]

 

 

I'd almost definitely say that's a good thing. The sooner she stops acting as a replete, the better. If she has her own repletes to take on that duty, I wouldn't be alarmed.

 

 

Thanks! I'm hoping so! She's still active. In fact, MUCH more active than she used to be, moving around and such whenever I see her.

[OhNoNotAgain]

On Sat. 2021/2/13 I began trying to get my Liometopum to move, hooking their mini-hearth up to a mini-Labyrinth.

Well as ofr today the 16th, many of the workers have moved BUT the queen and the smallest brood and a lot of workers are still in the mini-hearth. Iirc Lios are used to having satellite nests? I wouldn't be surprised esp. since they apparently like to live in trees. I'm a little worried as the mini-Labyrinth already looks 2/3 to 3/4 full AND that's without all of them having moved yet....

 

M. mexicanus: Hanging in there. But Good Queen was spotted today hanging out on the water tower, not actually hanging upside down. Still roughly 30 workers (including repletes), since I have the heat turned down for the winter.

 

Prenos: Sitting there starving. I have the one new Preno queen in a mini-hearth, but she just sits there and I think she might have laid a couple eggs ... waaayyyy over on the other side of the mini-hearth. 

[OhNoNotAgain]

2021.5.18 update.

 

Prenolepis: The mini-hearth didn't seem to be working - I'm guessing it's too large a space. THA's Mack had suggested a bifurcated, which I don't have. So I actually kicked them out of their mini-hearth and put them in a single test tube, then put them in a dark drawer (no other queen I have goes in a dark drawer except for Prenos). I peeked a couple days ago and saw a couple eggs FOR THE FIRST TIME.

 

Liometopum: They are doing well in their mini-Labyrinth. I should post a picture one of these days. They go through sugar water like crazy. They pick old dead bugs totally clean. They eat well, drink well, aren't fussy, and are bigger than Tetramorium. Plus, although these aren't local, they do survive here and there around town despite Argentines. I've become something of a Lio fan.

 

Okay M. mexicanus honeypots.

 

Good queen update: Some of the repletes have died I found one or two in the trash, looking like depleted balloons. The ones still hanging look scraggly. I've gradually turned up the heat and hope they kick into production mode.

 

Motley crew mexicanus: Well. Despite EVERYONE saying M. mexicanus love fruit flies, the last few times I gave them dead fruit flies, the dumb workers dragged them out as TRASH. I don't see a brood pile. Adopted queen is hanging around, still acting like a replete.  I'm getting concerned. I'm hoping the increased heat tells them to switch to baby-making mode. WAIT, EXPERIMENT WORKED: I just took a peek, and it looks like one of my experiments worked. I had dumped some dead fruit flies into the nest, then TILTED the mini-hearth so the dead fruit flies fell onto the nursery workers. Nursery workers seem to be smarter than their older siblings as far as recognizing food goes. Today there's a pile of dead fruit flies on the water tower. I don't think there's more than 2 larvae, but at least they have food now. If only the queen would start to lay....