djant's Pheidole Pallidula (2016)

[djant]

14th July 2016
I have heard a lot about these interesting little ants, but until I decided to buy a colony I hadn't seen them with my own eyes. The ants arrived today, and I was expecting around 30 workers but counted double that, including 8 soldiers! There is also a large brood pile. I had to tap these ants out of the tube they were in however, as it could not connect to the formicarium I had set aside for them and the tube had partially flooded during transit. About half a dozen workers were lost, although they seemed to have settled in very quickly.

17th July 2016
These ants have been about as active as my larger Myrmica colony, and with a hunger to match! They have eaten a small cricket every night since I got them, but do not seem much interested in honeywater, bloodworms or cooked meats. I have never kept these ants before and am surprised by the size of them, although they seem to be growing quickly as I've got a couple of new callow ants everyday already. The queen it seems has also started laying, which is a promising start. Next week I will try them with waxworms and maybe some ant jelly.

[djant]

It's difficult to make out these ants as my camera isn't great.

[djant]

25th July 2016

These little ants have been eating quite a lot. Maybe another 20 workers have eclosed in the last week, although the brood pile has shrunk to mainly larvae and pupae. I do hope that this queen will lay some eggs, which shouldnt be long with the amount of insect prey they have had.

[djant]

[djant]

4th August 2016

These ants continue to multiply, although the brood is now mostly larvae and pupae, there are still some eggs present. I have heard that these ants tend to lay eggs in batches, so the brood are mainly of the same stage of development. The ants are quite hungry for insects, but ignore honeywater and fruit. They are also very messy! They have left a piece of chicken and a waxworm in the nest which are now both growing mould. I may need to find a solution to this if the ants don't take the rubbish out themselves.

A view of the queen and brood:

[djant]

6th September 2016

These messy mischievous ants! They are real escape artists, and over the last few days I've had to capture maybe a dozen little workers, and I've taped shut the lid of the container until I can get my hands on some PTFE. In the meantime to feed the ants I've attached another tube into which I've been giving them crickets, locusts and honeywater. The ants somehow had also retrieved a Myrmica Rubra worker carcass, and were this evening pulling it apart. Looking carefully into the Myrmica outworld, I found a dead Pheidole worker too. I really need to keep my eyes on these little ladies!

In the short-medium term I am looking for an alternative formicarium. I need something more escape proof, and also as a response to the ants increasingly messy home. Unlike all of my other colonies, these ants are happy to leave pieces of cricket, chicken and waxworm to go moldy inside the nest where they cannot be retrieved. They have kept the two chambers where most of the colony reside quite clean though, so I can only assume it is not harming them, as the colony continues to grow and seems in good health. Nevertheless, I will get them a new home soon so I can clean out their current formicarium and maybe use it to house either my Camponotus Barbaricus colony or a colony of Tetramorium Caespitum which I have on the way.

View of the nest (sorry for the yucky mold!):

[occultus]

Nice colony mate, they are going to fill your nest in no time
To stop your Pheidole bringing food into the nest and then it turning mouldy, place crickets and other insects onto a long needle and leave them inside the arena. The ants will feed on these "Kebabs skewers" and they won't be able to pull the exoskeletons into the nest. You can even anchor the needles down on a piece of cork etc. I do this for my Polyergus rufescens.

[TenebrousNova]

Sept 7, 2016 10:05:58 GMT occultus said:

Nice colony mate, they are going to fill your nest in no time
To stop your Pheidole bringing food into the nest and then it turning mouldy, place crickets and other insects onto a long needle and leave them inside the arena. The ants will feed on these "Kebabs skewers" and they won't be able to pull the exoskeletons into the nest. You can even anchor the needles down on a piece of cork etc. I do this for my Polyergus rufescens.

That's a very good idea, I'm going to have to do this now. 

[djant]

Thanks for the tip! this is a great idea

[djant]

8th October 2016

These ants have really slowed down lately! There is a mystery going on though, the queen is gone! For the past few days the workers had huddled onto her, and today I saw in the next what could be a piece of the queens abdomen. I will monitor the ants closely as there are a lot of workers in the nest now, so maybe she could just be hidden.

[djant]

11th October 2016

Sadly it seems that the queen has died! I can find no trace of her, although I found a piece of carapace which could only be queen sized. There is still over 100 workers in the nest, and larvae, eggs and pupae so I do not know what could have killed her. The ants have been feeding well and had even started to remove some of the moldy food items in the nest. I will clean out the formicarium once the workers have died out, and I may try this species again one day.

[djant]

Monday 13th March

This colony has now completely died out. I have cleaned out the formicarium and plan to use it for another species probably this summer. I did enjoy my pheidole so maybe I will attempt to keep this species again.

[Wood~Ant]

Journal locked and archived. Sorry to hear of the death of this colony.