102 replies to this topic

[dspdrew]

Update 12-3-2014

 

I moved the year-old colony out of the foraging container, and put one of the newer ones in instead. The newer one actually seems to be doing better. The best new colony now has 11 workers, 3 cocoons, and a bunch of small larvae. Amazingly, it seems to be doing quite well.

[dspdrew]

Update 12-20-2014

 

One of the year-old colonies died about a week ago.

 

I had three of the newer colonies in foraging containers, but one died a week ago. It had a few workers and was doing great 'till the test tube failed and drowned the queen and all but one worker. I put that left-over worker in with one of the worker-less queens, and it wasn't long before they were getting along fine. One of the other colonies in the foraging containers has one worker and a bit of brood. The third and largest one has about 13 workers now, and a pretty good sized pile of brood. As for the queens in test tubes, I have five left, including the remaining year-old colony.

[dspdrew]

Update 12-30-2014

 

The other year-old colony died off.

[Gregory2455]

Queen too?

[dspdrew]

Yes. There were a couple workers still alive.

[dspdrew]

Update 1-17-2015

 

I moved the only other colony with a worker into a foraging container since I have so many extra containers now. This queen has remained stuffed full of byFormica forumula for a while now, and after the move the one worker quickly took advantage of the liquid feeder of humming bird nectar and filled up. Hopefully this colony will do a bit better now.

[Gregory2455]

Extra ... containers?

[dspdrew]

Yeah, I had 12 of them I was keeping my Acromyrmex in before I made those nests for them.

[Gregory2455]

If you have any to sell, well, then I will buy used.

[dspdrew]

 
Gotta bury the feeder!

[dspdrew]

Update 3-3-2015

 

I moved the large colony into a byFormica GroTube the other day. They moved into the nest pretty quick, but it took them quite some time to get the queen in there. She's so fat and lazy now that where she ended up after I dumped her out of the test tube was good enough for her; she simply didn't want to move. The nest is pretty wet, so they have since moved all the cocoons out and into the out world, while the queen and the larvae are still inside. This colony is up to 15 workers now, along with 8 cocoons, and 5 larvae.

 

Here's a little video I made showing how much trouble they had getting the queen to move.

 

[Miles]

Is that sand all over her gaster?

[dspdrew]

Yeah there was some sand on her gaster.

[antmaniac]

Look at that queen! She is like a honey pot! I wouldn't have problem retain my queens if they are as chubby as yours. 

Edited by antmaniac, March 4 2015 - 12:33 AM.

[kellakk]

Have they made any repletes yet? It looks kind of like they're using her as one.

[dean_k]

That is one majorly fat queen. And I feel like the queen's saying to her workers, "I don't give a damn. Leave me alone."

[dspdrew]

Have they made any repletes yet? It looks kind of like they're using her as one.

 

One worker is pretty stuffed full of the nectar too.

[Foogoo]

Have they made any repletes yet? It looks kind of like they're using her as one.

 

Do they wait for their colony to reach a certain size before making repletes? Do you think the repletes ever get bored or tired? I sure would...

[Miles]

 

Have they made any repletes yet? It looks kind of like they're using her as one.

 

One worker is pretty stuffed full of the nectar too.

 

They will use the queen as a replete until they have access to vertical hanging space.

[dspdrew]

Update 3-31-2015

 

Almost all the cocoons in the largest colony have eclosed now, but at the same time quite a few workers have died, so the worker count is about the same as it was during the last update.

 

I decided to move this colony into one of my small ant farm boxes. This will allow them to hang repletes from the ceiling like they're supposed to. The only thing I'm worried about is that this colony only has tiny little nanitics, and I'm hoping they'll be able to dig a large enough nest.