5 replies to this topic

[ElisAnts]

I have both founding queens of placops variant 01 and 02. I received the 01 variant from stateside ants and caught the 02 variant on south mountain on 2/22/24.

Just based off first glance the texas-based 01 variant is much larger than the arizona caught 02.

Placodops 01


Placodops 02


Both Queens have around 5 eggs. I will try to only look at them once a week and update this thread around the same.

[antsriondel]

Cool! I need to find some honeypots this year!

[BleepingBleepers]

Lucky. I mentioned in my CA02 journal that I was going to get some but sadly, things fell apart and I couldn't.

 

Will be admiring it from afar through reading your journals.

 

Good luck!

[ElisAnts]

Update: 4/3/2024

I received more placo queens. I now have three 01 variants and one 02 variant.

The first 01 variant I have had since the beginning is going strong, she has around 5 larvae that are close to pupating as well as a bunch of eggs. (Pictures aren’t great, but the queen also blocked portion of top with dirt.



As for the other two 01 variants and the single 02 variant, they had been struggling with laying eggs. I decided to remove heat at night and only heat during day. This seemed to help as the remaining 01 variants now have clusters around 15 eggs (still no larvae)




However my single 02 Placodops queen still would not lay eggs. This was super frustrating because I have had her the longest out of the other queens. I decided to change her test tube and substrate and give her a “new” start. Luckily this worked and she has caught up to the other queens with her own egg cluster of 15-20 eggs.

Will try to update in 2 weeks! As for now, heating at 85 degrees constantly during the day, with heat off during the night (temp ranges from 68-78 when heat off)

[Ernteameise]

Yay, look at her go!

Looking great!

[ElisAnts]

4/10/2024
PUPAE


The pictures will be better once they are out of the test tube. (Pupae are under queen)
All other queens have larvae and should have pupae by end of month!