ANTSTORE World of Ants

[JimmyVe]

I have seen to missed this topic earlier.

Antguy why did you captured 52 queens ? What if they all survived ? What where you planning to do whit 52 colonies of the same species...
I think i already said it before, why take so many queens if you only need like about 3 (to make sure one will start a colony). And when they all do start a colony you can release the other 2 colonies back where you have found them.

Another thing. This species DON'T have more queens in one colony !!! They will kill each other when the workers hatch and if the queens don't do it the workers will. It even could be they kill all the queens !

So FredeP, No it will not happen that your colony has 2 queens !

I know it is all fun and stuff but they are living animals, don't mess with them just for your fun !

[antguy]

sorry, didnt know it would cause so much offense

[JimmyVe]

We only want the best thing for the ants i'm sure you would like it to. Just think before you handle and i'm sure everything will work out just fine.

[delete-14751]

Why would you have needed 52 Queens?????

[pooball879]

you know what myrmica rubra have more than one queen.and before you see workers it will take up to 1 month depending on the spieces.

[pooball879]

yes they do some are darker than others.

[Kossae]

I know a guy who kept Formica fusca in pairs as an experiment. In one case, the one queen upon the birth of workers did not slay the other, but simply threw her out of the test tube (she resided to a small rubber tube). The losing queen was put in her own test tube, and has laid her own eggs again and is doing fine. Whether L. niger might stop before bloodshed in some cases I do not know, but it's worth a thought..

The "blue line" you see, as you will have realized by now, is not a sign of illness - it's simply food being digested!

[miszt]

There are quite a few species where queens will pair (or more) up at the end of the nuptial flight, even if not true Polygn species, Lasius niger are not a species which will usually tolerate 2nd queens tho, most queens are fiercly terratorial even immediatly after nuptials have finished, while some species (eg. Camponotus) will force the 2nd/3rd/etc queens into other sections of the nest once the colony gets too large, often this will result in 2 or more cooperative colonies within one nest, assuming that food is abundant enough and the nest will hold them all. Formica, are often true polygn, so i would not be suprised to find them tolerating, or fully integrating with 2 or more queens, some formica workers (eg Formica rufa) will collect up mated queens and add them to the nest after each nuptial flight, resulting in colonies with millions of workers and hudreds of fertilized queens.

Some ants take this further, and form giant super colonies which spread for 10's of kilometers, for eg Linepithema humile

These experiments dont need to be done imo, there is allot of information about already on this subject, I think its just morbid curiosity, to be forcing unrelated, non-polygyn queens to live together, tbh.

[SteveUK28]

i totally agree John.. Nice to see you back here mate