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sianhilton: Tapinoma nigerrium (22. Mai 2010 15:15)

I have had a colony of Tapinoma nigerrium for 12 months and about 3 months ago the queen died!
Since then, the colony still continues to grow with pupae which appears to develop into female workers.

My understanding when this happens, it is not uncommon that pupae are produced, but they are not fertilised and therefore develop as males and the colony eventually dies.

But not in this case. Can anybody shed any light on this situation?

Regards

baumarkthammer: Re: Tapinoma Nigerrium (22. Mai 2010 17:04)

They are very polygyn, can have couple of hundret queens per nest. I could imagine that it wasn´t the only queen.
A nest with only one queen would be highly rare.

sianhilton: Re: Tapinoma Nigerrium (22. Mai 2010 18:04)

Hi

Thanks for this.
Although polygyn I thought that the queens were still fairly distinguishable in terms of their size, and I cannot see any queen just various polymorphic workers. Unless the queen is somehow hidden amongst the workers.