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Post by TenebrousNova on May 13, 2018 19:21:39 GMT
Today I've ordered a colony of this species that Antsrus got in especially for me. These marvellous looking ants are a bright golden colour, much like Camponotus turkestanus- but less delicate, so I'm told. The colony will have one queen and 30 to 40 workers. Here's what they look like: I hope they do well, they're very uncommon and certainly hard to get hold of. Feel free to comment!
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Post by Wood~Ant on May 13, 2018 22:34:45 GMT
I'm quite envious, a lovely species. I didn't know Chris could get ants on special order?
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Post by TenebrousNova on May 13, 2018 22:41:10 GMT
I'm quite envious, a lovely species. I didn't know Chris could get ants on special order? Yes, he's happy to get in requested ants and reserve them. This colony was £90, but the only other colony I've seen for sale (On Detritus Ant's site) is $140 for a 10-20 worker colony, so I consider it a bargain. They should arrive on Tuesday! Hopefully I can get some nice photos of them.
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Post by Wood~Ant on May 14, 2018 7:00:53 GMT
I know this isn't a comment, but I found this and thought it would give you a taste of what these ants are like in person.
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Post by UKantz on May 14, 2018 7:01:16 GMT
They look great! Had to take a double take for a second, looked like you mashed the keyboard with the last name hehe. Good luck with them!
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Post by TenebrousNova on May 14, 2018 11:35:29 GMT
They look great! Had to take a double take for a second, looked like you mashed the keyboard with the last name hehe. Good luck with them! It took me a while to memorise the name! I definitely can't pronounce it. I think they're arriving tomorrow. Thanks Wood for the video!
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Post by Wood~Ant on May 14, 2018 14:46:21 GMT
They look great! Had to take a double take for a second, looked like you mashed the keyboard with the last name hehe. Good luck with them! It took me a while to memorise the name! I definitely can't pronounce it. I think they're arriving tomorrow. Thanks Wood for the video! The "T" is silent, so pronounced "fed - shenk - o - eye (I)."
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Post by TenebrousNova on May 15, 2018 9:01:30 GMT
Here they are! There's lots of workers and a plump looking queen. There's also some nice sized larvae and I think I saw one worker carrying eggs. Here's the queen. As you can see, a few of the majors closely rival her in size: They seem to be perfectly calm. Later today I'll introduce them to a spare acrylic nest.
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Post by Wood~Ant on May 15, 2018 9:06:34 GMT
Nice looking colony, I love them for their colour and size. Hope they do well and this journal lasts for a long time to come.
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Post by TenebrousNova on May 15, 2018 16:37:33 GMT
Earlier I carefully tipped the colony into their new acrylic nest. They've calmed down and put their brood in a pile next to the queen, but haven't actually moved inside it yet, preferring to camp out in the foraging box. Surprisingly, the workers are quite aggressive and won't hesitate to try and grab onto your fingers. As a major was making her way towards the little connection hole in the side of the nest, I realised just in time that I'd forgotten to plug it with cotton so I jammed my finger there whilst reaching for some...she was biting me the whole time!
Hopefully they'll move inside before long.
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Post by TenebrousNova on May 16, 2018 23:47:32 GMT
The cricket I gave this colony yesterday has all but vanished, so it looks like they've been feeding alright. I have noticed that although the workers occasionally stop to sip briefly at honey, they can be quite oblivious and sometimes try walking through it. I might have to dilute it so that it doesn't cause any accidents!
The colony remains stubbornly encamped in their foraging box for the time being.
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Post by TenebrousNova on May 21, 2018 11:27:10 GMT
It's rather unorthodox for my liking, but I've been placing honey and food into the actual nest area instead of the foraging box to avoid upsetting the colony. What should be the foraging and nesting areas are now reversed! The queen has settled next to the food dish. I can see several larvae and at least two eggs. Yesterday they ate a bluebottle.
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Post by TenebrousNova on May 25, 2018 23:09:51 GMT
When I opened the lid quickly to see if they'd be interested in a bit of bee pollen (Which they do seem to be licking and nibbling at) the queen was startled and stumbled into the actual nest part of the formicarium, which she'd never ventured into before. A few of the larvae are being kept in one of the first chambers and when the queen found them, she settled next to them and hasn't tried going back out to the foraging box. I'm hoping that if I'm lucky, the rest of the colony will follow her example.
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Post by TenebrousNova on May 27, 2018 0:42:53 GMT
The queen has stayed put inside the nest area with all the brood, although nearly half of the workforce seems to prefer standing around in the foraging box as usual. The colony has picked up quite the thirst for honey water lately and gone through two big drops of it today. The distended gasters of the well fed workers are clear and almost completely transparent, which looks rather nice.
At the moment they're chewing at a small moth that came in through the window earlier.
As a quick shoutout, I'm particularly interested to see how Wood's colony will do when they arrive next week, since there's very little information on people keeping fedtschenkoi so far.
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Post by UKantz on May 27, 2018 9:15:21 GMT
I just saw a fedtschenkoi colony come up for sale on a Facebook group I'm part of, it seems ever since I've seen your journal they've been creeping up here and there a lot.
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