Post by UKantz on Feb 25, 2018 12:58:29 GMT
26/01/18
Today was the day I ventured back into the world of antkeeping, ordering what will most likely be the most challenging species I've yet to keep - Solenopsis Invicta. Though I'm not home until March to actually view her for myself while at uni, she will be looked after by my family until I return.
29/01/18
The queen arrived in the post today with no seen brood. She was placed on a heat mat in a shelf in my room alongside my Lasius Niger and Messor Barbarus, who are all housed in test tubes for the time being. In a sense, I was relieved the queen did not have any brood; I had read about the explosive growth of this species.. though I was naive enough to think it would be over a month before her first workers would arrive.
25/02/18
I asked my Mum if she could check up on the colonies for me today, this being the first check since the queen arrived to avoid disturbing her too often. All 3 queens share a portion of the heat mat, with 2 queens having brood, but as you may have guessed.. our Solenopsis Queen had her first 5 workers already (who knows how long they've been around for)! It's quite astounding to think that an egg to worker can develop in under a month.
They have been fed a fruit fly and a drop of honey, which apparently they were very interested in, and I suppose weekly feeds are in order now for this colony as they grow and grow more rapidly.
I can't wait to return home in March to see all of this for myself! Hopefully pictures will be then too.
Today was the day I ventured back into the world of antkeeping, ordering what will most likely be the most challenging species I've yet to keep - Solenopsis Invicta. Though I'm not home until March to actually view her for myself while at uni, she will be looked after by my family until I return.
29/01/18
The queen arrived in the post today with no seen brood. She was placed on a heat mat in a shelf in my room alongside my Lasius Niger and Messor Barbarus, who are all housed in test tubes for the time being. In a sense, I was relieved the queen did not have any brood; I had read about the explosive growth of this species.. though I was naive enough to think it would be over a month before her first workers would arrive.
25/02/18
I asked my Mum if she could check up on the colonies for me today, this being the first check since the queen arrived to avoid disturbing her too often. All 3 queens share a portion of the heat mat, with 2 queens having brood, but as you may have guessed.. our Solenopsis Queen had her first 5 workers already (who knows how long they've been around for)! It's quite astounding to think that an egg to worker can develop in under a month.
They have been fed a fruit fly and a drop of honey, which apparently they were very interested in, and I suppose weekly feeds are in order now for this colony as they grow and grow more rapidly.
I can't wait to return home in March to see all of this for myself! Hopefully pictures will be then too.
. They had unfortunately been placed directly on the heat mat and the water supply had dried up.
