28 replies to this topic

[jplelito]

This is something of a joint journal, at least for now.  I’ll chronicle my F. pallidefulva, and relatives, here.  I originally thought Q1/Q2 were F. pallidefulva but on closer examination as the brood developed, and putting together a better camera setup so I could see them up close, I found the telltale dark marks on the mesonota of the queens; also Q2’s brood entirely had these beautiful peachy-tan cocoons, whereas Q1’s brood made pale cocoons but she chewed them off over time.  Based on Trager et al. 2007, I concluded these two were likely to be F. incerta.  I am highly confident on Q2 – she is a very darkish brown and orange ant with clear, dark marks on the median and lateral thorax.  Q1 has these marks as well – but they are fainter, and her and her workers are a lighter shade than Q2’s.  Maybe a Formica expert will see this post and chime in. 

 

Q1 and Q2 were collected as ‘F. pallidefulva’ on June 2^nd, 2020.  I was not expecting ants to fly this day – it dawned coolish, cloudy, with a stiff breeze out of the northwest.  The sun did come out by lunch.  Rain two days prior.  The breeze/wind persisted the entire day – these ants must be strong fliers. 

 

Q1 was found running along the curbstone at 12:15 while grabbing lunch at the parking lot of my workplace in Morrisville, NC.  Q2 was found in almost the exact same spot on the road at 4:15 the same day as I went to my truck on the way home.   Thank goodness I always park in the last spot at the far end of the lot – I would never have found these two ants otherwise.   Wonder how may I would have found if I had just lurked in that spot all day?  Would two species of Formica fly at the same time-ish on the same day?  This is why I surmise not – and that they are both F. incerta.  But who knows?  Queen ants are tragically understudied.  Anyone out there young and going to grad school?  Study them!

 

 

On June 7^th I transferred both animals in the 10 dram vials I collected them in (now had little egg piles each) to the outworld of THA mini-hearths.  I left the cap off.  Interestingly – neither animal ever moved out of the vial into the formicarium.  I had to dump these girls out by force once their brood emerged later and even then they were trying to run back into the vials as I scooted them.  But once underground they were settled in after about… four seconds.  Weirdos. 

By June 28^th, both had at least one pupa, with late instar larvae transforming over the next day or two.  Q1 ended up with 8, of which 7 hatched; Q2 ended up with 5, all of which hatched.  Q1’s first callows came on July 12^th; Q2’s came out on 7/21/2020.  This is a curious difference since nothing else about them was treated differently.    

 

By July 31^st, both Q1/Q2 had new egg piles, and the workers were gathering food for the queens, who become physogastric within a day or two. 

 

As of today, 8/11/2020, Q1 has a nice family of 7 mature workers, a number of pupae in cocoons, and a ball of eggs and 1^st instar larvae.  Q2 has 4 workers (one just up and disappeared – did they cannibalize her? – no way she got out) and her own set of cocoons and eggs/tiny larvae.  Happy families so far. 

 

 

Q3 (Formica pallidefulva or…?) was collected on 7/12/20 from a sidewalk in Cary, NC, at 6:30 PM.   PM storms the day prior, hot, humid, still day.  Over the next few days, she laid a clutch of 10 eggs, but these were lost on 7/25/20 after her cotton/water in the tube molded severely over a few days when I hadn’t checked on her… my fault!).  She was quickly removed, fed honey water, and transferred to a THA mini-hearth.  A new clutch of eggs was laid 1-3 per day over the next 6 days, totaling 10 by that time.  These were larvae by 8/8/2020 and as of this post on 8/11/2020 there are several, 4-5 mm larvae; she sits right over them at almost all times so they are hard to count – probably 6-8.   She seems to be doing well, aside from being annoyed with me about her first batch, I'm sure.   I expect the larvae will pupate shortly and, based on the lack of dark marks on the thorax of Q3 I would expect them to be naked as pupae.  We’ll see.  I’ll post an update on that. 

 

 

[ANTdrew]

What a great start to the journal! Could you take a look at my Formica cf pallidefulva photos in my journal. I’d appreciate your opinion. She has eight workers now, but they aren’t as red as your girls’.

[jplelito]

Time for an update, though, admittedly a bit of an anticlimactic one.  It seems perhaps the three girls have gone into diapause, though they are all still eating like crazy - but no new brood added in a few weeks now.  Formica are weird. 

 

Q1 is still leading the pack, now with 11 workers.  Here's her and her girls with a yummy scrambled egg treat:

 

 

PS - if you cook eggs for yourself or your early-instar humans - the little crusty bits left in your frying pan are ant-manna and will attract A. almost any ant species in your yard, especially Pheidole (dentata and tysoni) and B. make your captive colonies exceedingly happy.  Waste not, want not.

 

Interestingly, some of the second batch of workers are smaller than the first batch!  Uh.. what?  They eat constantly, emptying their honey vial and protein sources within a day or two, and they're all obviously engorged, so this must be a normal-weird-Formica thing. 

 

Q2, still adorable with now 7 workers and 4 cocoons (these should eclose any day now):

 

 

Q3, still the awkward cousin - a very dark ant with very darkish workers (now 3, with 5 pupae/cocoons - some have been naked, others enclosed in silk, so... yep.  Formica are weird).  These go nuts for honey or sugar or anything like this, and are more active during the day than Q1/Q2's girls (although all three colonies are mostly crepuscular, just these ones less so).  It strikes me also that Q3 (the queen herself) is quite a bit smaller than the other two.

 

 

Formica are interesting if you like a colony of ants that reliably sits still and cuddles each other.  They are less interesting, at least at this stage, if you want active ants that tear apart prey or do much of anything.  On the bright side, unlike my Pheidole, they are not trying to bore through their formicaria at this point.  More on that in another post.  

Edited by jplelito, September 7 2020 - 5:33 AM.

[ANTdrew]

Looking good! My Formica go nuts for hard boiled egg yolks, too. They keep taking protein, but only my pallidefulva still have brood. I may just put my F. argentea in the mini-fridge. Definitely weird ants.

[AntsDakota]

Yeah, Q3 could very possibly be F. incerta, or just a darker variety of pallidefulva.

[jplelito]

Spring 2021 Update 1 – Multi-Part

 

Part 1a – Oct 2020 - March 2021

 

All three queens ceased egg lay in August 2020 or so, and so by mid-October I put them in my unheated/uncooled attic space, as there was no further sign of any activity (though the workers took water and sugar and sometimes even a fly).  The attic gets pretty cool (down in the 40s) in the winter and it turned out to be a really nice spot for them to overwinter.  I did need to fill the water towers periodically but no other maintenance was needed.  All three colonies basically piled on top of each other over top of the water towers and stayed that way.  I did notice that by later January/February, with the return of some days in the 60s/70s outdoors, there was some motion, moving around, rearranging of sand particles etc. as well as reaction when I checked on them – much different than the Componotus style overwintering that is more like complete torpor where you can push the ants around with a brush and they don’t react.  Maybe this was driven as much by photoperiod as temperature – my attic has a north facing window so the ants experienced essentially the natural outdoor change in light cycle, with a slight insulation in minimum temperatures. 

 

Part Ib – March-Apr 2021

 

All three Formica queens survived the winter with no obvious problems.  The two putative incerta queens Q1/Q2 ‘reactivated’ quickly in mid-March when brought into the house (temps around 68-70 or higher); the putative pallidefulva colony Q3 was more sluggish about it and lagged behind the other two by 2-3 weeks (in fact for the first week they plugged up the outworld entrance with gunk and just sat on top of the water tower in a ball looking morose).  In Q1/Q2 (the F. incerta) after 1-2 weeks the animals produced eggs and these developed quickly into larger larvae.  Fed on caterpillars, worms, etc. from the garden and honey/water solution.   Note to my comment on the pupae in early entries – Q1/Q2 continue to produce cocoons on the larvae, and in Q3 there are sometimes cocoons but as before mostly they are chewed off by the workers while the pupa inside is still white and far from eclosion. 

 

Part II – May/June 2021

All three queens now have increased their families reasonably, although none of these colonies is growing as fast as, for comparison, a second-year Camponotus or similar large ant in my experience.  They do not lack for food, they simply lay small egg clutches and, more or less, wait until those have become large larvae to lay another small clutch. 

Q1/Q2 and Q3 are still acting much like different critters – Q3 has darker workers which seem to be a bit smaller, and they are very much carnivores.  A caterpillar or small fly dropped into the formicarium is pounced on, bitten etc., and dragged underground wholesale (which makes cleaning these a pain in the gaster because they’re super lazy about bringing the garbage out).  Q1/Q2 seem more likely to gorge on honey/water, and rather than dragging large insect prey underground, they seem to bite/pierce it and drink the contents aboveground (they do take tiny things like fruit flies underground and are much better nest-cleaners generally).  Q3’s colony continues to grow more slowly than Q1/Q2; interestingly, while in Q1/Q2 the original workers from 2020 all seem to have died off and been dropped in the trash, Q3’s colony retains its initial workers as near as I can tell – either there has never been a carcass, or they eat it without leaving a trace.  All three are somewhat secretive with their brood, hiding small larvae and eggs in nooks and crannies, or a worker will lurk right on top of the larva and make it hard to count them.  My best guess at current worker counts is:

 

Q1 – 20-25 plus some brood

Q2 – 35 or more plus a big pile of brood now (like dozens)

Q3 – 15 plus brood

 

Q1

 

Q2

 

Q3

 

All three are at the moment in the middle/end of the second brood cycle for this year; meaning they have medium and large larvae, even a few pupae, and the queen is very skinny and not yet ready to lay more eggs.  New workers from 2021 have already emerged into all the colonies but in Q1 and Q3, the first-brood numbers were low – only a few new ants.  Q2 did much better and her colony is larger now.  Observationally, her workers seem to keep high fat contents (extended bellies) at all times.  They all get the same food so this seems to be a built-in difference.  I rather like the colony ‘personalities’ I see and they are all different. 

 

One interesting change this year – the pupae.  Q1/Q2 now in the second batches seem to have a mixed bag of naked and cocooned pupae; the same is now true for Q3 as well (meaning rather than chewing the cocoons off now some or all are left on).   Last year the difference had been absolute during the summer.  So, to the comment above about maybe being the darker morph – who knows.. J  I’ve often wondered about all these ‘morphs’ – are there hidden species in there somewhere (not just for Formica but for many of the genera).   If I had ten each of these, and I could gauge the ‘personality’, food preferences, hunting behavior etc. this might be a bit more scientific.   Maybe these three are just variations within a species, maybe they aren't.  Once the colonies get bigger, I will remove a worker from each, pin it properly and try to key it out using Trager's pub and I can put that more on solid footing.  

 

These are cool ants, if still a bit less active than I’d hoped (unless you carelessly touch the shelf they are on – vibrations make these animals go nuts); the fact that so few folks keep them to me makes it worth it just to see what they do.  Interestingly, despite continuing to lurk when I can at the spot where I found Q1/Q2 last year, we’re now more than two weeks farther in summer and no new live queens have been found.  I found a partially destroyed “Formica pallidefulva group” alate on the sidewalk at work (thorax was hollowed out by Monomorium so I couldn't see the markings, errrrrrrrg!), around the other side of the campus (couple acres away more or less), on 6-1-21 – one day earlier than the prior year and with similar weather.  I had a dozen vials on me because I knew it would be a possible flight.  But that carcass was it!  Things flying at the same time last year, such as Brachymyrmex patagonicus, Camponotus pennsylvanicus and C. castaneus, Temnothorax curvispinosus and T. pergandei, and Pheidole dentata and P. bicarinata, are all flying again more or less on the same schedule.  I will keep looking but I must have really been lucky to find these last year.   I found Q3 in July 2020 so obviously the hunt is still on.   At least I offer this - in North Carolina, these start to fly the first days of June on breezy days with overcast, not always with rain the day prior.   This is not a hot/sunny AM after night storms ant.  As for Q3, that one might be a hot/sunny day ant.  Let's see what I find this year.  

 

Side note – I am apparently much better at keeping ants than journaling about them since this update took forty ant-generations to post.  I will work on it.    J

 

[ANTdrew]

Nice work! I’m still grieving the loss of my bright red pallidefulva colony. Check out my Formica journal. The colony was keyed out to actually be subsericea, not argentea. I have them in a big dirt setup now that they’re thriving in. I estimate they are at 100 workers by now.

[Polyacanthus]

Your Q3 looks just like my specimens, which I believe to be F. pallidefulva. From what I remember they have no obvious hairs on the gaster, so I believe your Q1 and Q2 are something else. Mine are also VERY sensitive to vibrations and go absolutely nuts if you bump their shelf- frantically grabbing brood in their jaws and running like maniacs in every direction.

Edited by Polyacanthus, June 25 2021 - 2:14 PM.

[jplelito]

July 6 2021

 

Queen 1 *might* be hitting her stride – despite getting near the time of year I would have expected (based on last year) these to slow down and raise the larvae they’ve got into workers and then be done, she surprised me this morning with a gigantic pile (for her) of 30 + eggs.  It was maybe 20 at 7 AM and by now (7 PM) it is more like 30 or more.  She’s still got an ample abdomen and two callow workers are basically following her around antennating the tip of her abdomen furiously, so it’s possible this represents the first true growth spurt for this colony and I dare hope she still has eggs to lay.  I am very happy about this!  I was just worrying that, despite doubling from 15 à 30 workers or so in 2021, the colonies might be winding down active growth (no eggs in a while).   

 

 

Her “sister” Q2 and the “cousin” Q3 (the pallidefulva) are just rearing out their little batch at the moment as noted in the previous post.  Fingers crossed I can see something like this happening to them soon.  Everybody gets extra dinner tonight. 

 

I found a live dealate queen incerta on the weekend but she died almost immediately in the vial; subsericea collected same time and locale are fine so I am genuinely unsure of what happened (also pretty sad).  I found a dead alate incerta on the sidewalk today near my home.  So they're definitely out and about in central NC - keep the eyes open!  

 

[jplelito]

Late-July 2021

 

Good news all around.  Q1’s brood pile is now a mix of egg, larvae and pupae – she has started to continuously add eggs since the previous update.  They’re so squirrely it’s hard to get a count.  Q2 has also produced an, albeit slightly more modest, egg pile – but her colony is much larger in terms of workers so they’re still keeping even with each other I think.  Q3 is rearing out her latest batch as well (remember, she started winding up for the season later, so I still would love to see a bigger clutch, fingers crossed), which is now 8 pupae and between 8-10 large late instar larvae.  Interestingly Q3’s colony is back to chewing off the cocoons, which are whiter and thinner than the peachy-tan cocoons on the pupae of workers of Q1/Q3. 

 

Q1:

 

 

The other good news is that, between July 4 and July 13, I was able to collect an additional five queens.  Q4 comes from the same area as Q3 last year (about two blocks away, sidewalk on the same road) and Q5 and Q6 come from a new spot I found where Formica are abundant a little over a mile from there.  Q7 is from my work campus and was more or less found in the same spot as Q1/Q2 were last year, and at the same time of day – 12:15 – on the same parking lot/woods edge/picnic area.   Q7: 

 

 

I had been lurking as I can in my incerta spot at work all summer and FINALLY found one.  I had just about given up.  Since then, I haven’t seen another one in that location despite favorable weather on many days, including several Formica subsericea flights in the same spot.  I did however find one additional female (Q8) on the same patch of pine straw/open woods (nearly the same spot here, too) as Q6, about a week later (they look similar but not identical).  I am starting to get a good sense of where to find them, if nothing else.  Also of note is that despite one day on the weekend spending HOURS looking I still only found the one (always at that 12:30-1:30ish window).  But – I find one (rarely two; I also sometimes find a live dealate and a dead alate on the same stretch of sidewalk) almost every day I can go look.  And the weather can vary from hot calm and sunny with little wind to hazy/overcast with a breeze; plus it can be the day after a rain or four days since the last rain.  They definitely fly differently than a lot of other ants.  

 

One definite injection of confusion – I find at work a few here and there dolosa workers in the same general area as where I found Q1/Q2 and Q7.  F. incerta and F. dolosa share the dark thoracic spots on the queen so… I will need workers on all of these to make final determinations.  But it will be great if I can link the worker ID to the queen for the future for other finders of Formica queens.  I still stick to Q1/Q2 as incerta simply because the workers are very light orange and not very hairy, but certainly not smooth.  The dolosa at work are dingy rust colored and obviously fuzzy up close so we’ll see about these new ones.  Here’s Q8:

 

 

As of this note (24^th PM) all five new queens have little brood piles of various sizes (Q4 has around a dozen late instar larvae, while Q8 is still brooding an egg pile – so, good news indeed.  All for now.  Thanks for looking! 

 

[ANTdrew]

Such beautiful ants! Looking forward to seeing them growing huge colonies.

[Polyacanthus]

Great photos!

[jplelito]

Mid August 2021 Update

My herd of Formica are looking good.  Some updates by queen:

Q1 – has 25 workers; these are young workers now with all last year’s having died off (you can sort of tell by color and cuticular wear) as near as I can tell.  She continues to produce eggs now – there have been at least a handful present in the brood pile for weeks – rather than in little batches spaced out as before.  She has at least 20 cocoons (a handful are naked but most have the characteristic peachy cocoon), 5-10 large larvae, and a ball of middle-instar larvae and eggs (in which I estimate N=40 all stages included; really hard to tell).  Even if these are her last brood for the year, if everyone makes it, she could easily be going to diapause with ~85-95 workers this fall.  I’ll take it. 

 

 

Q2 – more or less similar to Q1; has 35 workers (mostly on the young side), 15 cocoons and large larvae about to pupate (again, handful naked but most in silk), and an egg/little larva ball around 20 animals. 

 

Q3 – still the smaller of the second-year colonies; 30 workers, 8-10 pupae (mostly naked), a handful of small larvae and maybe an egg or two.

 

 

And now for this year’s critters -

 

Q4 – Her first pupae were seen in late July; she now has 5 pupae and 4 more larvae.

 

 

Q5 – A pile of large larvae and pupae, maybe 6-8.

 

 

Q6 – A pile of large larvae, was able to count exactly 7 when she had them spread out for feeding.

 

Q7 – A nervous critter.  She only has 2 big larvae and 3 tiny ones; I am fairly certain she ate several of the larger batch a few weeks ago for whatever reason.  She also lays and eats a lot of eggs.

 

 

 

Q8 – a growing pile of mid- to large larvae now.  Estimate 8-10, she keeps them 3D-stacked at all times so harder to count than the others. 

 

This journal is a bit busy now, but for once there’s a lot going on.  I plan to snag a worker each from Q1/Q2 and get them under the good scope at work; with that I should be able to cement the ID and share some good photos.  If I’d have known the oldest were all about to drop dead and get chopped up for the trash heap I’d have taken one before they did, but, you live, you learn.  Hopefully more updates in a bit when the new queens get their workers.    

 

[ANTdrew]

I’m so jealous!

[jplelito]

Long-Overdue Update, Part I - History

 

Diapause crept in around mid-September and by mid-October 2021, all colonies were starting to shut down for the winter (no eggs, few or no larvae or cocoons, reduced foraging despite warm room temps).

Mid-October 2021 –

 

Q1 – A large brood of workers fattening up with gasters full of white fatty goodness; N~80.  No further eggs, etc. 

 

Q2 – Mostly workers, fattening up.  A few pupae/cocoons left.  No further eggs, etc.  N~70.

 

Q3 – All happy, overstuffed workers - they look halfway to Prenolepis-level repleteness.  The colony has taken up the huddle position on top of the water tower and that’s that for the year!  There are ~ 40 workers now at the end of their second summer.   Definitely same behavior as last year – a bit earlier to bed than Q1/Q2, with distinctly cuddly behavior.  Q1/Q2’s workers stay spread out, and while they may aggregate and join into groups, the whole colony does not tend to stick right together like this. 

 

Q4 – 3 workers, Aug 16-17 first eclosion.  Currently, 8 workers.

 

Q5 – 1 worker, Aug 16 first eclosion.  Currently, 6 workers and several more pupae. 

 

Q6 – 5 workers, Aug 16-17 first eclosion, currently with 11 workers. 

 

Q7 – 1 worker, Aug 17 first eclosion.  There are five workers, and three pupae remain. 

 

(note that despite collection dates across about a week, the workers all emerged more or less together on these)

 

Q8 – 1 worker, August 23^rd first eclosion.  Now with four workers. 

 

Q4-Q8 laid no further eggs, as I expected based on Q1-Q3 the year prior.  But, if history repeats, I’d expect these five new queens to bulk up to the 70-80 range next year.  Fingers crossed. 

All colonies moved to my unheated attic on Nov. 15^th, but most had no activity or late-emerging cocoons long before that.  A few still took afternoon sips of sugar water but largely not.  They all seem well prepared for winter.

 

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

 

Long Overdue Update, Part II – April 2,2022     Q1-Q3

 

Winter 2021-2022 was full of ups and downs – the week between Christmas and New Years featured several days near or at 80F here in NC, with ridiculously warm overnights in the 60s.  Then in early January we got a lot of ups and downs, followed by a fairly prolonged cool stretch in February with a lot of frosty nights – not unusual in and of itself but felt weird after the ridiculously warm early winter; outdoors a lot of plants had begun growth far too early and paid the price with a lot of frost damage.   There were a lot of drastic swings – high one day of 70, well below freezing the next night with only 30s/40s high the next day, etc.  During this time, I lost two of the new queens from 2021; I can blame the weather, maybe… this was also the time of the mega-die-off in Q2’s colony (see below). 

Starting on March 7^th, when we finally got a stretch of ‘normal’ temps (which I realize for many outside of NC seem ‘warm’) in the range of 58-64 outdoors, I began to bring the colonies into the house and get them under lights, on heat, and to get some food into bellies. 

The original colonies, now entering their third growing season -

 

Q1 – looking good, 50-60 workers survived the winter.  At about three weeks post-warmup, we have eggs and first instar larvae, with the number of eggs growing daily.  Taking sugar and protein daily and keeping the queen engorged.  I can say with certainty that the rate of egg production is much, much higher than last year at the same time post-warmup.  This might be the year they go nuts.  Fingers crossed. 

 

 

 

Q2 – had an absolutely enormous die off of workers in mid-winter rest, all were neatly carried out into the outworld and stacked up in a far corner.   Fewer than 40 survived.  However, the survivors appear perfectly healthy and are acting normal.  A large and growing pile of eggs and early instar larvae now, with more eggs seemingly added daily.  Same as Q2 – compared to this time last year, egg production is higher. 

 

Q3 – came through well, with minimal worker loss and with all workers remaining pretty well engorged with fat.  Still around 40 workers.  They’ve started to build an egg pile, as well; this is earlier than last year (there was a long wait!) and it seems that, like Q1/Q2, I am seeing the start of a much more active growing season as the colony begins to ‘grow up’.   

 

I also moved Q1 into a new, homemade formicarium just prior to diapause.  The other two were ornery, and I am trying to move them now by simply connecting the old world to the new, while letting the old nest dry out and keeping the water and food in the new nests.  Q2’s workers have been very brave about going over and getting food, and spend a lot of time puttering around, but have yet to move the queen and brood.  Q3’s family is like…whatever.  They seem to be rearing their brood entirely off of stored fat, because they haven’t touched the foods in the new nest. *shrug*  

 

I’ll post another update on Q4-Q8 soon, I hope.  I lost two of these new queens during the winter, sadly – one potentially to a pathogen.  The others are fine.  So, all in all, OK – I lost more queens this winter (2) than I would like and certainly not with the 100% success rate of 2020-2021.  Nonetheless, the herd grows, and that’s what matters.  I’m curious to see what Q1-Q3 pull off this year in growth, as that will guide me on whether I keep grabbing a few more queens or consider my ant collection as big enough.  (Is it ever?)  In fact, it's only two months until I'd expect to start finding this species group's new queens outside.  I think I'll make space on the shelf.  You know, just in case.  

 

[jplelito]

Spring 2022 Update, Part III

 

Frist, a note about my homemade formicaria.  This took quite a lot of learning last year, but I am pleased, at the end, with the later versions of what I made.  Here are some examples:

 

 

Q1 is living in the above nest on the left (Q3 on the right) and seems content with it; they moved in last autumn and spent the winter here:

 

 

Currently, about 50ish workers from last year, another ~50 cocoons, 15-20 large larvae, and then several balls of eggs and tiny larvae.  A very good growth spurt that far surpasses what they were up to this time last year.  The main switch this year is really on this continuous brood-production as opposed to start/stop the first year, and only slightly overlapping last (the second) year. 

 

Q2 is still spending half-time in each of their homes (old and new).   But they’re raising a good brood pile with cocoons, large larvae, and some smaller larvae mixed in; similar to but a little less productive as Q1’s colony. 

 

Q3 finally just up and moved the whole colony one night after entirely ignoring the new nest for around 8 weeks.  Doing well, with eggs-larvae-pupae in production, although as usual at a much reduced quantity/rate compared to Q/Q2. 

 

Q4 – came through winter well enough, lost four workers but the rest look fine and the queen is nice and engorged.  She has a decent brood pile of around 10 larger larvae and 12 cocoons, plus a few eggs and several smaller larvae; some sign of mostly overlapping brood production, which would put her on track to keep pace with Q1’s development.  This is a darker ant in the workers, and the queen is skittish but from the rare, good looks I can get I do not see the dark marks on the thorax.  

 

 

Q5 – died and was consumed by her workers during the winter, and the workers also dropped dead one by one within a few weeks of the queen.  One worker bloomed into a fungal mess.  I tossed out the whole nest just to be safe. 

 

Q6 – died after a few days of whacky up-and-down winter temps, and was dumped into her outworld by the workers.  The workers lived for a while without deaths, but I dumped them in the freezer when Q5’s worker bloomed with fungus. 

 

*why did both animals (Q5,Q6) found at the same location/time die only a few weeks apart despite same care and same conditions as all the others?? Did they catch some pathogen there?  Or just bad luck? This was very odd, and very sad.    

 

Q7 – came through well, with all 11 workers alive and feeding like crazy.  These are taking a lot of sugar and basically acted awake after 1 minute out of the attic – somewhat different than the others who took a few weeks to ‘warm up’ and start taking food.  Nonetheless egg lay was different than the others – they only now just have a reasonable egg ball and maybe a few first instar larvae.  This ant colony has paler workers than Q4; I don’t see any dark markings on the thorax of this animal either.    

 

 

Q8 – alive and well.  Lost one worker during the winter but the queen and the other three look fine and are taking food well (especially the little dangly green caterpillars falling from all the oak trees lately).  The queen was up until recently looking enormous and has a “huge” brood pile – I can count at least 14 larvae, and there are also ten cocoons and a few eggs/few small larvae in addition, but the queen is no longer super engorged so I think this colony will head for the more iterative second-year brood pattern (taking a break until she has a new set of workers, then more eggs again, is the guess).  I still strongly suspect this one is F. dolosa – the queen clearly has the dark thoracic markings of incerta/dolosa but unlike Q1/Q2, is darker and hairier (and maybe a bit larger, but, with only a few animals to compare this is really subjective).  Her cuticle looks dim and does not reflect much light in photos.  This colony is really doing well, and they do seem to act a bit differently than the other colonies – the workers are not so skittish, and not shy – they’ll lap honey from a fingertip and take small caterpillars right off the forceps.  They also react far less to vibrations – shelf bumps and the like that send the other colonies into full-blown panic don’t seem to disturb these.  The cocoons are dull pink-brownish very much like the F. incerta, but there is one naked pupa in the pile. 

 

 

More details as updates are worth it – likely we’ll just be adding eggs etc. and kicking into summer gear, especially on the older three colonies.  Starting in mid/late May if this warm weather holds (which based on today's weather forecast, it won't!), I will be trying to prowl the woods at lunch every day to see just how early these guys show up this year – and how much springtime weather affects that. 

 

It’s been very dry in central NC, and no Pheidole bicarinata are flying yet locally, so we have a bit to go I think (these are kind of my canaries for 'start of warm-season ant flights').  Looking back, 2020 was early – I found Q1/Q2 on June 2; I found Q3 on July 12th.  2021 was later at the front end – I found the first Formica pallidefulva group queen on July 4^th, but then again, I only found them through the 13^th (close to the same end date as the year before, +/-).  F. subsericea kept flying until August 4^th (that I saw).  So, did I miss the first month of flights in 2021?  I will try to put a third date range on that data set this year.  A very interesting group and they’re getting to be my focal ants.  Cross fingers, if Q1/Q2’s colonies grow like this all year, I have a hope that they might make reproductives next spring. 

 

Has anyone reading this ever reared a Formica colony to alate production?  I'd be curious for your input.  

 

[ANTdrew]

Some of the best Formica colonies on here. Keep up the good work!

[Lamarr]

Nice colonies!

[jplelito]

July 1 Update 2022 

Q1 – first new workers from 2022 started emerging May 9-10^th, then continuously to date, a few a day, more or less.  Colony is looking good and there is full-spectrum brood production.   I did notice in the last week or two, a few older workers dying off; replacement is still >> die off though.  Doing well. 

Q2 – first new workers eclosed on May 15^th (just a few, but more followed soon enough).  They finally moved into their new home overnight 13^th to the 14^th – the move triggered maybe by the sense that the brood would emerge?  I generally don’t believe too much in coincidences.  Same as Q1, basically just continuously pumping out a steam of eggs.  A few new workers seem to eclose every couple of days. 

Q3 – first new workers started to eclose on May 29^th, and steadily thereafter.   Hungry, and continuing to produce brood; always at a slower rate than Q1 and Q2, though.  Otherwise, good, and growing. 

Q4 – First new workers emerged on May 24^th, and steadily thereafter.  This colony is easily the most aggressive drinker of sugar water, and fastest growing numerically, of the 2021 colonies (and maybe all of them if the pattern holds).  They are darker workers that closely resemble Q3’s, though the queen herself is lighter in color by a bit, than Q3.    Same tendency toward tearing apart insect prey, but these ones take as much of the sugar as anyone else, too.  There are over 35 workers, and brood, too. 

Q7 – Far behind the 2021 pack, but taking food constantly and making plenty of eggs.  Maybe, finally, a few first instar larvae, but these seem to grow for a bit and then get eaten.  It seems like for most of the season, the queen continuously was engorged and produced eggs, but none or only a few hatched, and they were consumed.  She’s not sterile, obviously, as she made workers last year.  They eat, they poop, they make eggs – and that’s it.  I have no idea.  Not one single new worker has come this year, but there’s always an egg pile.  This colony is just different somehow.   

 

 

 

Q8 – First new workers (2) emerged on May 12^th; these immediately tanked up and had huge, pale bellies.  The older two workers are now less engorged and seem to function as the main foragers.  As of today, we have ~ 20 workers and a full spectrum of brood objects.  Some of the newer cocoons are starkly bigger than the cocoons of any other colony (not reproductive, big!) and I can’t wait to see the ‘majors’ these yield.    

Now for this season.  On June 4^th, right on cue, I found a dead male alate of the pallidefulva group on the sidewalk.  I took as much time as I could to patrol for queens, but found none, despite it just feeling like a Formica day – still, warm, slightly humid, with clear skies.  (Note for next paragraph – no rain here for days and days at that point).  On June 7^th, I found a dead incerta dealate female on the sidewalk at work – she had just died because her antennae still gently twitched and she was soft, despite being on hot asphalt in 90F sunlight.  Rats! 

But, redemption.  On June 8^th, I found a perfect dealate incerta (Q9) running across hot open ground at around 12:30 PM.   Q9 has already reared up her first cocoon, with 5-6 more big larvae, by this post.  She is not so pale as Q1, but very similar markings on the thorax. 

 

 

 

 

June 9-18 featured mostly hot, dry, and often windy weather.  I saw males being kicked out of the parking lot incerta nest at work many mornings on my way into the office, but didn’t recover any additional queens despite looking when I could. 

On Father’s Day, I was rewarded with seeing for the first time a small flight of Formica pergandei, my local dulotic Formica, at a park near my home.  I captured two males, an alate female, and a single dealate female.  I’ll circle back on her. 

 

 

The 21^st of June 2022 may go down as my best ant day ever.  Dawn was overcast, even foggy at ground level, and calm.  The fog rapidly cleared out and the skies completely cleared around 11; at this point, the incerta colony at the edge of our parking lot went nuts.  Alates (males, maybe 30-40, only from one colony; females only (I counted six) from another about 150 feet away) launched within minutes of the sun hitting the nest entrances, and around 12:45 I found a dealate female (Q10) not far off, running over the hot asphalt at parking lot’s edge. 

 

 

 

I decided to take an afternoon conference call as a walking meeting, because that’s what all the cool kids do these days.  Rewarded for that, I was, hmmm. 

I visited a spot on campus where I have seen raiders previously; fortunately there was an active raid and I was able to snag about 30 pupae and another 10-15 cocoons (so far they’re all F. subsericea) from the raiders as they went across the trail, in the hopes of jump starting Faora (the pergandei dealate).  More on that part later.  Surprise!  I recovered three additional dealate female F. pergandei, all within about 100 feet of the raiding column.  In fact, one was trying unsuccessfully to steal the pupa being carried by a raider.  That’s how I spotted her!  Subsequently I’ve seen several other feral dealates trying to do this. 

Then, I found another, darker incerta, as I took the trail back to the office.  Q11! 

 

 

There were also numerous subsericea males and dealate females running around all over the woods.  It was definitely a Formica swarm day. 

 

After a few days, Faora started stacking up, grooming, and generally spending a lot of time on the captured pupae.  As of today, she has two subsericea taking care of her, grooming, getting sugar water, etc.  She continues to take care of her little pupae pile, and is not so lean as she was at capture.  So far, so good.

 

 

Since then, subsericea has flown almost dozen times to varying degrees (I see one to many dealates), and I’ve found dead dealate incerta around the parking lot several times – almost always headless.   Today, at lunch, I recovered a wounded (front left leg totally not functional) incerta queen staggering around, as well as an alate female, also kept.  I don’t have high hopes for either, so I won’t name her yet.  I also found two more dealate pergandei today.  I have, more or less, seen these wandering around the trails and sidewalks almost every day since the Father’s Day flight.  It must take them a long time to find their victims.  The funny thing is, I don’t ever remember seeing the queens before.  Maybe a good year for them? 

Philosophical aside - I have been wondering, how do the ants themselves perceive the time to fly?  I used to think it was the rains, like for many other species, but this year has been staggeringly dry.  Does it have something to do with rate of daily photoperiod change?  Specific weather conditions?  Other?  In central NC, the animals fly from early June until mid-July with now three years of rather intensive looking for me.  This period in our area also features a daily rate of day length change of less than a minute (meaning, from, about +1 min on Jun 1 to -1 minute by July 15).  Is this the ‘limit’ at which ants can sense the change in photoperiod?  Does that tell them when to start, and then stop, flying each year?  (Like this:  message to ant brain – if you can’t tell if days are getting longer or shorter, barf out the alates!)   I wonder if this period matches other areas or is just a coincidence.  Might be, I spend too much time thinking about ants.  

 

At least for this group, it seems like rain is a much looser (or zero) link to their flight activity than for many others – I have found queens up to 10 days since rain (this to me, seems like a lousy synchronization cue at that point).  In an area like central NC, where rain is incredibly local and fickle at this time of year (it’s basically all convective, not frontal, and you can easily have a flood warning across town from D2 drought – look at UNL’s drought monitor if you think I am exaggerating), you wouldn’t get but very highly localized flights based on the storms.   This would reduce the area-wide flights for mixing of genes unless they use some other cue and almost guarantee inbreeding.  So, they’ve outsourced the cue to something else.  Thoughts?

 

Last thing – though last year I didn’t actually catch a live pallidefulva group queen until the 4^th of July, I can’t help escape the feeling that this year is winding down already.  Even my reliable parking lot nests have been quiet now, and when I do see queens (like today) it’s deeper into the woods or not at all.  It’s also getting worse with the drought, which may force their hand to cannibalize any remaining repros in the nest.  OTOH, I haven’t found a non-marked (e.g. pallidefulva vs. incerta/dolosa) queen yet, and Q8 – the likely dolosa – was found last year in mid-July.  We’ll see!

 

[ANTdrew]

Another great update! Thanks!