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Post by graeme on Jun 6, 2020 13:11:48 GMT
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Post by Joshuarr on Jun 6, 2020 14:08:12 GMT
Sorry to hear about one of your queens, Graeme. Do you think the injury took place during the journey to you? Was the colony well wrapped by Ants HQ? I have never ordered from them (but have considered doing so for my next colony). I am sure once they're settled they will start laying again. Your formicarium looks great, where did you get it from? Looking forward to hearing more about your colony.
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Post by graeme on Jun 6, 2020 16:17:03 GMT
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Post by graeme on Jun 6, 2020 22:31:05 GMT
Left hand queen has found the foraging box; missed her climb up there but she’s exploring every inch and she’s a climber!
Hopefully she might munch on the chopped up bug I’ve left there 🐛
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Post by graeme on Jun 7, 2020 14:39:38 GMT
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Post by graeme on Jun 7, 2020 18:40:31 GMT
Well both ladies were out foraging today. Don’t know if they ate anything but left out some dead crickets for them.
I won’t know if they are laying eggs until I see larvae I guess and the nest is covered in red acetate and is also painted white....guess I’ll find out in a couple of months 🤷♂️
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Post by graeme on Jun 8, 2020 15:18:24 GMT
I’m going to add 2 more queens to this colony to see what happens.
As the 2 existing queens are still very much in the founding stage I thought it’s the best time for them to accept new nest mates.
Fingers crossed there won’t be any killing involved.
The 2 queens at the moment are very opposite; left hand queen is out all the time foraging whilst right hand queen is content to sit in the warmer more humid part of the nest. I’ve noticed she often has her gaster bent in towards her body at times, is this her laying eggs?
I can’t tell if they are eating the food I provided so I’ll just keep adding fresh food every 2 days and see. I’ve added some live fruit flies today but no interest so far, the dead ones were ignored 🤷♂️
They have fresh water in test tubes and tube tubes plus ant nectar in byformica feeders.
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Post by graeme on Jun 11, 2020 23:53:15 GMT
So trying to add a replacement queen went really badly; the new and one of the existing queens went straight into battle mode and unfortunately this was in the nest so I could not separate them.
Unfortunately they both fought to the death 😢 so the colony now has 1 queen.
I did read that adding the new queen could work but then I found another article (after the battle) that they generally only adopt a new queen to a large existing colony.
So down to one Queen now, fingers crossed
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Post by graeme on Jun 21, 2020 9:37:12 GMT
So it’s all looking good! Just had a sneak peek and there are several larvae hidden behind the red acetate so they are very hard to see.
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Post by graeme on Jun 22, 2020 15:16:40 GMT
Arggghhh having no luck with this colony! The nest is now full of mould. To be honest I’ve not been too impressed with this one from anthouse so I’ve bought a new vertical acrylic nest with a sponge for hydration so see if that works better... hopefully the queen won’t get too annoyed with all the shenanigans
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Post by graeme on Jun 24, 2020 17:20:46 GMT
💀 colony deceased before the new nest arrived.
I’m going to try the 3 poly queen colony again and see what happens
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