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I cought my Camponotus chromaiodes in July. The colony had 4-5 workers and some brood. later on i boosted my colony with brood from a large wild colony, about 25+ brood.
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now the colony has 30+ workers but no majors, and 35 + brood of all sort.
I moved the colony into a small plaster setup.
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I cought my Camponotus pennsylvanicus colony in June. The colony had 10-12 workers and a small batch of brood.
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Now the colony has 30-35 workers 2 majors 1 male and 40-50 brood.
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I cought my Formica subsericea colony in august. The colony had 50-60 workers and 20-30 brood. I later boosted them 60-70 brood.
Now the colony has about 150-175 workers and 20-30 brood.
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I cought my Formica slave maker queen in july. boosted her 30-35 brood and most of them are born now.
She should be laying eggs soon or next year. Unlike Polyergus this specie can live without slaves, but need a host colony to jump start their own colony.
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I captured a single queen of Tetramorium (caespitum( one of the unID'ed species) in july.
Now the colony has 350+ workers and 200 brood, the colony is mostly boosted.
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small vid
http://www.youtube.com/v/MykBTz5gM98&hl=en&fs=1
Why do u boost ur colonies? I enjoy raising the colony from small, the most.. Maybe you don't have the patience.
Othervise very nice pictures.
I allways hated the first year of a colony. I just try to skip the first 1-2 years of a colony growth to increase my chance of success.
Ok. I understand boosting a young queen with a few cocoons to increase chance of succes.
Also i've boosted a ~30 workers formica fusca colony to maybe 300 workers. But the colony died during hibernation.
But if there's something to kill off a young colony, there's a risk it could kill a mature one too.
Very nice ants and pictures.
Only i don't understand the boosting. I only do this when it is really necessary. I know the first year is not very fun but that is no reason.
Increase your changes could be a reason but if the queen is not strong enough to start there own colony she will also die when you boost that colony and than you have a lot of workers without a queen.
I have started with a single Messor barbarus queen in mid-February and they are now at about 300 workers now (counted them on a photo). The first year CAN be fun, if you have the right species. :)
Anyway, I really like those photos and I'm awestrucked by the diversity over there. I myself am beginning to specialize on American ants. To be more precise: on Myrmecocystus cf. mimicus. I had four queens of which one died because of a test tube flooding...
Anyway, the rest is doing pretty well for now with the biggest colony counting 14 workers.
Nice Tigga, can you place some pictures of your ants ? :)
I've got a little journal with some photos and youtube links: http://www.antstore.net/viewtopic.php?f=124&t=9391 .
I also recommend you my Youtube page: http://de.youtube.com/user/antblogger .
It's getting updated pretty regularly with videos of my Messor and my Myrmecocystus colonies.
Ww, thanks. Very nice pictures and blog. :) Good luck with these ants.
Nice! sadly both genus of ants are found in the west.
Small honey pot ants Prenolepis imparis are found im my area. :o
http://www.myrmecos.net/formicinae/PreImp18.html