7 replies to this topic

[nathant]

1. Location of collection:                  Downtown City, Southwest Michigan

 

2. Date of collection:                           10/4/2016

3. Habitat of collection:                      Sidewalk near a curb lawn in the middle of a city

 

4. Length:                                            ~6 mm  

 

5. Color, hue, pattern and texture:    Dark Brown, large and distended abdomen, abdomen looks kind of furry?  all of the other ants I've collected around here have been smooth and shiny - she looks like her abdomen is very, very slightly furry.

 

Pictures: http://imgur.com/a/lfm9Z

[Air]

It looks like Lasius Neoniger

[Alabama Anter]

Ya, some sort of Lasius species

[Canadian anter]

Lasius pallitarsis or neoniger. A closeup of the mandibles would help

[nathant]

Are all Lasius species parasitic?  I'm not sure I want to attempt this for one of my very first colonies...
This looks incredibly challenging and now I've got two different lasius queens on my hands.

 

What would you do?

 

I found this: http://www.formicult...cial-parasites/

[Kevin]

No, only some are. Lasius neoniger is not. +1 to neoniger for the id.

[nathant]

Awesome, thanks!

[Batspiderfish]

Lasius neoniger is just most likely, but the actual characteristics to distinguish this queen from Lasius pallitarsis are not present in your photographs.