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Very nice MilitANT. ;)
July 8th, 2007
Bad and great news for todays updates! :D
Colony A:
The Queen has her first worker! I am so excited and I am so happy for her! She must have been born during the night when I was sleeping because she is almost as dark as her mother. She is very small and very clumsy. She has several dark colored naked pupae which I expect to eclose some time today or tomorrow. I think it is cute to see the Queen being so protective of her. She spent several minutes cleaning the worker -- isn't it her job to clean the Queen LOL! Workers come very fast for this Tetramorimum species. I remember the day I collected her -- feels like yesterday.
She still has a very long way to go but I am just so happy she's made it this far. :)
Colony B:
Bad news here -- the moisture in the test the Two Queens have is almost gone! I didn't think it would evaporate so fast! I hope they can last until their first workers are born, then they can make a move to another test tube. I am not worried but this is just not a good thing. The good news is they are still cooperating and their larvae seems to be growing very big. Naked pupae should appear some time this week.
Colony C:
The colony is slowly getting used to people exposed to light. I fed them more nutri-cal calorie supplement but I don't think they like it. I will try a boiled egg today. I know for sure they love crickets. These ants also have a wierd smell. At first I thought it was the crickets but it's really the ants. I wonder what makes them smell this way?
In other news!
I think I have identified three of the Queens as being Crematogaser kennedyi. I still can't figure out what the other Queens are. I am modifying my journal to note their progress.
Crematogaster kennedyi #1
This Queen seems to be the smartest and most diligent. She burrowed beneath the cotton plug in her test tube and has hidden half-her body under there. I say half because she can't fit in all the way -- her butt sticks out! I think she has eggs but I am not sure.
Crematogaster kennedyi #2
I don't think this Queen will make it. She has crawled half-way up the test tube and just sits there, unmoving. It seems like she has no desire to start a colony. I wish for the best but I doubt she will make it.
Crematogaster kennedyi #3
This Queen sits against the cotton plug which is what most of my Queens do before they start egg-laying. I think she has eggs already but the white dots are so small I can't be sure.
Formica (sp?)
This Queen definitely has eggs. She laid them the day after I caught her! She is so small I expect workers within four weeks.
I did have five newly mated Queens but sadly one of them (a formica) died a day later. She seemed perfectly fine. I wonder what happened...
Try feeding your
Crematogaster kennedyi queen (the one you think won't make it) a mixture of sugar honeyed water. This is what I did with the leg less fire ant queen I found (who sent a few days in a gel formicarium). Worn out from an ant attack (which amputated one of her legs) and tired from spending a few days in the unnatural gel, she was she required some much needed nutrition. As soon as I let her gorge on the cotton ball dipped in sugared/honeyed water, she soon after laid a clutch of eggs. The water acts as moisture, the honey brings a natural smell which attracts them to the cotton ball and the sugar gives a much needed boost of energy to them which then sends them into an egg laying cycle. Therefore do this:
Take a bowl of distilled or spring water and dissolve a few drops of honey and a little bit of sugar in it. Then dip a piece of cotton in it till its saturated and expose the queen to it. Hopefully she will immediately start to gorge on it. Work with her and you will be surprised with how you can save queens which at first don't appear 'motivated'. So go ahead. try and feed her.
July 10th, 2007
Sad news today and yet still some good news too. :cry:
Colony A:
The Queen's first two workers are dead. I am not quite sure what happened. On the night of the 8th I checked on my Queen and her worker and I noticed that the worker was somehow attached to a second eclosing worker. They seemed to be stuck or glued together. I had to forcefully separate them. The second worker attempted to recover but seemed to have broken legs on all sides -- she died. The first worker seemed to be OK for a while but then she too collapsed. This 'sticky syndrome' continued to plague the colony ever since.
The Queen would get stuck to the cotton plug. Pupae would get stuck to the walls of the test tube. I don't know WHY this was happening especially at this point -- everything was going so well! I forcefully removed the Queen and her remaining brood into a new test tube. I also removed her wings (they easily came off) so that she wouldn't get stuck to anything else. She seems to be handiling all of this stress very well. She does have one new worker that seems to be doing OK but I am afraid for her. The other remaining pupae are darkening and I think they are dead. :( I hope the worker and the Queen can survive until the second generation arrives. This will be tough.
Colony B:
The Two Queens are doing so very well. They now have naked pupae. This is all happening sooner than I expected. I am really happy they are doing well together. They also have several larvae and eggs left. I would offer them food but I do not want any accidents to happen to them. I am already stressed out over the first Queen.
Colony C:
I offered the colony a cricket but they declined to eat it. I will be feeding them a boiled egg later today. I am sure the Queen will appreciate the protien from the egg whites -- hopefully that will fuel her to lay eggs.
Crematogaster kennedyi #1
This Queen still proves to be one of the best. She has laid a clutch of eggs underneath her cotton plug and refuses to leave them.
Crematogaster kennedyi #2
At first I thought this Queen would fail but now she has a small clutch of eggs and I am happy. She hovers over them like a good mother. Maybe I was wrong after all.
Crematogaster kennedyi #3
I confirmed eggs in this Queen's test tube. She lays besides them and hardly moves.
Formica (sp?)
This Queen has become swollen with eggs! She has a huge batch of eggs beneath her. I didn't know she would be this prolific. I am expecting a huge colony from her!
Sorry to hear they died (workers of colony A) i'm not sure what you mean with the sticky syndrome. I understand it seems that they are glued to everything but i never experience it before.
Jimmyve: The first worker seemed like he was stuck to the second worker. I separated them and then the second worker seemed to be suffering from broken limbs. The first worker never recovered and died. The Queen began to stick to everything inside the test tube. When I fed them sugar water I placed it after from the Queen and brood and I cleaned out everything I could. I don't know what the problem was. :( The Queen now has one worker and some eggs. The remaining brood is dead but the worker keeps caring from them.
That is rather weird (the sticky part) could it be that they where sticking together from the sugar water ?
Again I update my journal with both good and bad news:
The workers have finally hatched in Colony C and all have survived BUT... a Queen is missing! Yes. She has simply and completely VANISHED. Two days ago I offered the two Queens a Q-tip soaked with syrup. I left to visit with friends and ended up staying out for two days. When I came home one of the Queen was gone and the workers were hatched.
I left the test tube open at one end so that the Q-tip could stick out at the end. I put the tube inside of a container and shut it just in case one of the Queens was feeling adventurous. I'm thinking either she escaped out of the tube and the container or the workers killed her and completely devoured her corpse. There are absolutely no remains. This shall remain a mystery...
That is in deed a mystery. ;)
I don't think the workers killed/eaten her. That is not a normal behavior for ants. In my experience if a queens dies the workers ore bring her outside like they do with other workers ore leave her in the nest and do nothing about it.
July 20th, 2007
The more I update, the worst it seems to get...!
Colony A:
The Queen and her worker are no more. These were my favorite ants and I am sorry to see them go. Their end was spectacularly tragic as they were murdered by the ants from Colony B. :(
Here is the full tragic story from beginning to end:
The test tubes of both Colony A and B were on the desk, sitting side by side. Colony A had one Queen, some brood and one worker. Colony B had one Queen, eleven workers, and several brood. Somehow they managed to push out their cotton plug and remove the colony plug attached to Colony A. Outnumbering the first colony, they killed the solitary worker and the solitary Queen. They adopted the brood as their own and now they live in Colony A's test tube. :cry: It's been an amazing series of events but I am devastated by the outcome. Hopefully, these ants will remain where they are and not escape. I have to be very careful with them -- they are extremely lethal and I have other Queens and colonies on my desk within close proximity to their test tube.
Colony C:
The cotton plug nearest to the water is becoming vile with ant waste and decomposing food. I need to figure out how to move them and fast.
Crematogaster kennedyi #1
This Queen has eggs and larvae.
Crematogaster kennedyi #2
This Queen has eggs and larvae.
Crematogaster kennedyi #3
This Queen has eggs and larvae.
Formica (sp?)
This Queen has a massive pile of eggs and larvae.