91 replies to this topic

[LC3]

Boxes of bubblegum? 

Edited by LC3, August 5 2015 - 11:23 AM.

[dspdrew]

No, it has to be what Terry hates, and that's bubblegum sunglasses guy or boxes of dirt.

[LC3]

All his effort on making amazing hand crafted formicarium and outworlds with the help of a 3d printer bested by boxes of dirt made by a guy wearing sunglasses and bubblegum 

[dspdrew]

Update 8-19-2015

 

One of these queens died last night, so I gave all of its brood to one of my Myrmecocystus mexicanus queens. They all have a few cocoons at this point.

[dspdrew]

Update 9-5-2015

 

I'm pretty sure the M. mexicanus killed all the brood from the one of these that died in the last update. Maybe mixing subgenera isn't going to work for Myrmecocystus.

 

Another one of these just died, leaving tons of cocoons behind. I gave all of the brood to the one remaining queen. She should get some workers any day now.

 

I also took two cocoons that were very close to eclosing, and gave one to an M. yuma colony, and the another to an M. navajo queen to give mixing subgenera another try. So far it looks like both have been accepted. I marked both of these colonies with a green sticker.

[dspdrew]

Update 9-7-2015

 

The only queen left got her first worker today.

[kellakk]

Update 9-7-2015

 

The only queen left got her first worker today.

 

Wow, it's crazy how precise their life cycles are.  My only good queen got her nanitics today too.

[NightsWebs]

Do you have a link to the paper?

[kellakk]

Here it is: link

[dspdrew]

Update 9-10-2015

 

This colony is up to eight workers now. I'll get some pictures later.

[dspdrew]

Update 1-17-2016

 

This colony slowly died off until just the queen was left, but then today I just found the queen dead. She died because I accidentally let the nest dry out. This was one out of six colonies I lost because of this. This is the reason I can't deal with nests that have to have water squirted into them every so often. I can't keep track of exactly how dry or how humid it has been, and with lots of colonies, it's really easy to accidentally let them dry up.

[dspdrew]

Update 10-30-2016
 
I found another two of these queens near Joshua Tree National Park, September 20th 2016, after a rain storm finally went through the area.
 
One queen died a couple weeks after, but the other one is still alive, and just got its first five workers. I'm hoping I do better with these this time around. Last time I was still trying to raise them in test tubes, which just does not work well at all for honeypot ants.
 

 

 

 

 

 
 
One little worker hidden in her chamber.
 

[dspdrew]

Update 11-4-2016
 
This colony already has at least ten workers. They opened their nest and came out for their first meal.
 

 

 

[Foogoo]

Update 11-4-2016
 
This colony already has at least ten workers. They opened their nest and came out for their first meal.

 

I'm surprised they can sustain themselves this long with so many workers. I was getting worried when my Pogonomyrmex made no attempt to dig out an entrance with 4 workers.

[Solenoqueen]

Update 11-4-2016
 
This colony already has at least ten workers. They opened their nest and came out for their first meal.
 

 

 

Cool! Any hanging repletes yet?

[Alabama Anter]

Update 11-4-2016

This colony already has at least ten workers. They opened their nest and came out for their first meal.





https://www.youtube....h?v=sMmG_LeaECo

Cool! Any hanging repletes yet?

Probably not

[dspdrew]

Update 2-12-2017
 
This colony was doing great until the queen just died. She was producing a ton of brood and they even just got their first replete. It was a couple years before I found this species again, so who knows when I'll find another queen.

[Alabama Anter]

awwwww.... Sorry to hear that...

[dspdrew]

Update 7-23-2017

 

I found another five of what I think are these queens in Nipton, California on 7-18-2017. A couple of them I found while in the process of digging their founding chambers. I put them all in dirt box setups and they started digging their new nests in a matter of minutes.

[dspdrew]

Update 8-30-2017

 

I just found one of these dead today.

 

All four remaining have workers now. They got their first workers a few days ago.