76 replies to this topic

[CheetoLord02]

I hope to order some inception chambers once I get paid on Monday. I hope they don’t take too long to arrive because I have some fast hrowing colonies at the moment.

Don't get your hopes up. I've got one arriving today for my P. obtusospinosa (will be updating this journal as soon as it comes) but it took an entire 2 months to ship out. I'm sure if you let Mack know that it was a bit more urgent he'd make them faster though. The past 2 I ordered also only took 1 month instead of 2, so I'm not sure what's up with that.

[ANTdrew]

Dang. In that case I’ll either DIY something or else order a ready to ship mini-hearth. I’d rather have more of an overhead view for my tiny species, though.

[CheetoLord02]

Update 8/28/20

Today I moved my P. micula and obtusospinosa into their new nests, a Fallen Fortress for the micula and an Inception Chamber for the obtusospinosa. Both colonies have settled in nicely, and seem to appreciate the extra breathing room. The micula especially needed an upgrade, as they had gotten to the point where they were literally nesting in the outworld.

Here's a video of the P. micula:


And some pics of the obtusospinosa:

 

These guys definitely have a lot of growing room, however they are known to be able to grow absurdly quickly, I just need to get on powerfeeding them. Also ignore the absolutely terrible major that they have, these guys get majors far larger than her. She's only so dinky because she's the colony's very first, and I've also been underfeeding them quite a bit. Oops.


In other news, most of the founding queens have larvae at this point:

P. vistana

 

P. hyatti

 

P. xerophila

 

P. vallicola

P. gilvescens

 

 

I'm very much looking forward to all of these guys getting workers. Hopefully I'll start seeing pupae within the next few days or so. I'm always impressed by how quickly Pheidole larvae develop. I feel like these queens all just had eggs a few days ago, and now they're already close to getting pupae!

Edited by CheetoLord02, August 28 2020 - 8:36 AM.

[TechAnt]

Best of luck on the vistana! Based on drew's journal they seem fairly a challenge to raise. But they look super cool too.

[Antkid12]

Pheidole obtusospinosa is my new favorite Pheidole!

[ANTdrew]

This is shaping up ro be a really cool journal. I’m glad to see more people giving Pheidole the spotlight they deserve.

[TheAntGuy]

I've got a 6 queen founding group of a pheidole species that I am gonna keep long term after seeing this journal lol. I think they are either Ph. Gilvescens or Ph. Xerophila

[CheetoLord02]

I've got a 6 queen founding group of a pheidole species that I am gonna keep long term after seeing this journal lol. I think they are either Ph. Gilvescens or Ph. Xerophila

It should be very easy to tell the difference between gilvescens and xerophila, as gilvescens are a much brighter color and significantly smaller. I have a hunch that P. gilvescens are polygynous, due to their size, but since I only have 3 or 4 queens I'm deciding to not risk it and keep them separate. P. xerophila are not polygynous, to my knowledge.

[TheAntGuy]

Its likely gilvescens then.

[CheetoLord02]

Update 9/6

First relatively big update here, my P. vistana perpilosa queen has workers! So far 4 of them, with 2-3 more pupae still waiting to eclose. (edit: yeah, got this ID wrong before. seeing the workers made it pretty obvious.)
 

 

 

I gave them a small drop of honey, and I'll be offering protein as soon as the workers harden up a bit more.

In other news, the "P. cerebrosior" that I had before are definitely not P. cerebrosior. I think they're P. cavigens or P. spadonia, but I'll need to wait for workers to be sure. The queen featured in the journal before has pupae now, and I also caught another 10 or so since then. A few died overnight, but I still have around half a dozen new ones and of course the original one is still doing great. Expect lots of updates soon, as many of the queens are well on their way to getting workers.

Edited by CheetoLord02, September 6 2020 - 6:13 PM.

[CheetoLord02]

Update 9/8

Several queens have been getting their nanitics now. Here's some pics:

Pheidole furtiva
 

 

I had originally called this queen P. gilvescens, but after seeing the workers it's clear to tell that's not the case, as P. gilvescens are part of pilifera-group, and these workers are clearly flavens-group. There is a chance I still do have P. gilvescens queens somewhere in my collection, but this colony specifically is P. furtiva.

 

Pheidole hyatti
 

 

 

Pheidole vallicola
 

 

 

The Pheidole perpilosa colony is also growing very steadily. They're up to almost 10 workers now, and I just fed them their first protein. They seemed to like it. They are surprisingly active and aggressive for just being nanitic workers.
 

Edited by CheetoLord02, September 8 2020 - 4:01 PM.

[TechAnt]

How are the obtusospinosa doing?

Edited by TechAnt, September 8 2020 - 5:18 PM.

[CheetoLord02]

How are the obtusospinosa doing?

They're still a bit stagnant at the moment, but still healthy. They've got a good sized major pupa in their pile, so I'll be sure to update this journal once she ecloses.

[CheetoLord02]

Update 9/18

Most of the Pheidole from this season are getting workers, except for those that were infertile, namely the "Pheidole sp." shown in the very first post. Despite shedding her wings and laying eggs, the eggs never developed. Let's get into some of the updates with everyone else, though:

Pheidole spadonia

My personal queen/colony is doing very well. She's getting an absolute ton of nanitics, and her next generation is also developing nicely. Unfortunately, of the 12 queens I caught from the 2nd flight of these guys, only 3 are left. Easily the worst success rate I've had so far. On the bright side, my personal colony has succeeded and the other 3 seem to have larvae at this point.
 

Pheidole micula

These guys continue to be the greatest colony of all time. As of last update, I had moved them into the Fallen Fortress, and they took up roughly half of it. Now they're using all but one chamber regularly. On top of that, they're producing the largest majors I've ever seen from them. I thought surely the larvae would be alates, but nope, just giant majors.
 

Pheidole perpilosa/vallicola

Both of these colonies are just about in the same boat. I have 1 queen of each, and they are both closer than any others to getting their first majors, with each having a major larva in premolt.
 

Pheidole xerophila

These guys unfortunately seem to have a success rate that's almost as bad as the P. spadonia. Of the 5 dealates I originally caught, 3 have died, and only one got workers. To make matters worse, the queen that did get workers only got 2, and both died in under a day. As a desperate last-minute attempt to save them, I boosted each of the surviving queens with a few pupae from my P. pilifera colony, and it... actually worked. I'm not that surprised, as xerophila and pilifera are very closely related, but it's still cool to see a queen with workers of a different species. One of the queens has 1 pilifera worker now, and most of the other pupae are going to be eclosing shortly.
 

[ANTdrew]

Phenomenal!

[AntsDakota]

Phenomenal!

I concur. I'd trade all my species for all those Pheidole.

[Ants_Dakota]

 

Phenomenal!

I concur. I'd trade all my species for all those Pheidole.

 

Not sure if i would do that, but i would for sure need one species of phedole right now. how to find them...

[Antkid12]

Cool!

[CheetoLord02]

Update 9/29

Quite a bit has happened since the last update, so I'll just go ahead and get right into it!

Pheidole obtusospinosa

Unfortunately, this colony is unlikely to make it. Only around a day before their new major was going to eclose, I checked on the colony to see every single worker was dead. I have absolutely no idea why. The queen was still perfectly fine, and most of the brood seemed to be fine as well. I moved the queen and brood into a test tube, but the brood didn't make it after a few days. The queen is still alive, and I'm hopeful that she'll be able to refound, or possibly accept brood of another Pheidole species. I'm really not sure.

Pheidole hyatti

This colony has an interesting update. Just yesterday I saw the queen appeared to be dead, or at least very close to dying. She could only move her back legs, and barely, and she was flipped upside-down. I simply righted her and left her be, just for the hell of it. Well the next morning I checked again and she was largely fine. Full movement of all limbs, and could stand on her own. She's still a bit lethargic, but I'm confident she'll bounce back. I've never had a queen recover from such a terrible state, so needless to say I was very impressed.

Pheidole vallicola

This colony is doing amazing. They've got well over 2 dozen workers, a major, and tons of brood, including another major pupa. The current major isn't much to look at, but the pupa is already larger than the current major. Still I doubt their majors will end up being too impressive, but I still think they'll be respectable.

 

 

 

Pheidole perpilosa

With the inception chamber now left empty after the fall of the P. obtusospinosa, I decided to move the P. perpilosa in after a nice deep-clean. They were becoming impossible to feed without an outworld, so I simply placed the test tube in the inception chamber's outworld for them to use. I just intended for them to move into the nest when they wanted to, as they were still a bit on the smaller side to be ready for a move, but surprisingly they vacated the tube overnight and settled into the nest. They even have a major pupa that'll probably eclose by the end of the week.
 

 

 

Pheidole xerophila

These gals are interesting. Of the original 5 dealates I had, only 2 remain. One founded successfully, getting 2 nanitics, however both nanitics died within a day of eclosing. The other queen never got past eggs. As a last-ditch effort, I boosted both queens with around 5 P. pilifera pupae. Unsurprisingly it worked, and now both queens have larvae of their own! I'm hoping they are both successful, and it honestly makes me sad I didn't boost the other queens before they died. 
 

 

 

Pheidole furtiva

These guys have been very pleasantly surprising to me. Being flavens-group, I would have expected them to be relatively boring to keep, however this has so far not been the case. They have a large brood pile, including a major larva in premolt. It'll be exciting to see how these guys get along for sure.
 

 

 

Pheidole cf. gilvescens

I had previously mistaken my P. furtiva queens as being gilvescens, however this time I'm a bit more confident. This colony is pilfiera-group, meaning they very well could be gilvescens. I need to wait for majors to be sure, but it definitely seems likely. Either way I really like how this queen is winged, and her colony is doing very well. Excited to see how these guys get along.
 

 

 

Pheidole sp.

This is the unidentified queen from the first post. She never made it past eggs, meaning she's likely infertile, however after seeing the success with my boosted P. xerophila, I decided to try with her. I gave her a nice pile of P. micula pupae, and so far all is well. A major and 3 minors have eclosed, and so far there has been no aggression. I don't know if this will make anything, as the queen could very well actually be infertile, but I figured it was worth a try. My micula definitely have pupae to spare. Apologies for bad pic.
 

 

 

Pheidole micula

After moving into the Fallen Fortress, this colony took off. Or continued to take off. Honestly not really sure which. They made one batch of absolutely massive larvae, almost as large as the queen, that I was sure would be alates. Alas, they pupated to reveal they were, in fact, just some absolutley massive majors. Given that I found this queen with nanitics in late March, it's likely they fly in mid-late February, meaning they should make alates within a few months or so. I'm really not sure, though. Either way, here's a recent video of them going to town on some termites. Live prey is their favorite, that's for sure.




Pheidole pilifera

This colony has really started to take off. They now have well over 500 workers, dozens of majors, and are quickly filling their nest. I'm not sure when I'll need to move them or where I'll move them to, but we'll be needing to worry about that relatively soon. Here's a quick video on them.

Edited by CheetoLord02, September 28 2020 - 11:06 PM.

[ANTdrew]

This journal is like Pheidole 101. I love it.
How do you recommend handling diapause for my P. bicarinata colony? I live in a decently cold area, but I’ve heard some people recommend not hibernating them. Thoughts?