After my Queen died (April 27th 2014) I was left with only 4 workers. The workers slowly died off and I just left the water in there until I could be bothered to clean everything out and start again. After coming back off holiday a few days ago I decided to buy a new queen from Antstore.This afternoon I set about dismantling the nest - ready to clear it all out. I noticed a single worker come out of the nest. A little surprised at seeing any ants still alive I collected it in a test tube with a view to figuring out what to do with it at a later date. Gave it fresh water and a cricket thinking it must be hungry! As I moved more of the sand out of the nest, I saw another worker with something white in its mouth. I scooped that worker up too and then very carefully scraped more sand back. To my disbelief, there are 4 larvae left in the nest!!! I've put all of them in the test tube - it seems the nest had mites in it which is odd because I only give them crickets that have been frozen in the freezer so I'm at a loss as to where they came from. I initially thought that the queen died because it wasn't humid enough for her but since April 27th, there's been no additional humidiy in the nest, no additional food and the only drinks for them was some honey water and clean water. I can't believe how many eggs there are.
The issue I have now is that when the new queen arrives - presumably with her own brood but no workers - is it possible to introduce the old workers & or old brood to the new queen? The old workers haven't had a queen to serve for months now and the 4 eggs/larvae all look healthy and haven't been eaten.
If it's not possible to do this, I dont really know what to do with the new queen and the old ants as they will be alive for a good few months without their own proper nest.
Any advice greatly appreciated
