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Post by Deleted on Jun 3, 2012 14:22:26 GMT
There is a mass swarm of P. diversus tonight in northern Thailand (June 3rd) - The last two years I have not been back in time to observe the swarming habits of this species but this year I have made it just in time - as I arrived in Thailand last Monday!!! Talk about luck. Have managed to take a few photos so will post soon.
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Post by Wood~Ant on Jun 3, 2012 14:44:27 GMT
Really looking forward to those pics Peter, and if you get a good video of ants in Thailand don't forget you can enter the competition  |
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Post by TenebrousNova on Jun 3, 2012 15:23:20 GMT
Planning on catching any queens? I love this species.  |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 4, 2012 13:43:24 GMT
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Post by adam15 on Jun 4, 2012 13:50:50 GMT
That is incredible!
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Post by Deleted on Jun 4, 2012 14:14:29 GMT
The info : The males started flying about 7pm which is shortly after the sun had gone down. These gathered around the night light that I had set up with the aim of catching some alates. The males kept arriving in ever increasing numbers for about two hours.
I had not seen a single female and started to think that maybe all the local colonies had only produced males this year. Then after about 9 pm the females started to arrive. As soon as they flew onto the white bag I had placed on the ground they were immediately surrounded by a mass of males which were all trying to mate with them.
The females kept arriving in small numbers for about two hours and in the end I managed to catch 32 (I had to stop then as I had no containers left!). I scooped up the females along with the attending males with a spoon and placed them in individual containers. The next morning when I checked them over every single female had shed their wings which is a sure sign that they had been fertilized.
The next stage is to try to raise colonies from these queens. I have placed 28 of them in a range of different sized containers with earth and they have now all dug out a nice chamber. The other four are housed in small plaster nests and I am going to try and give them a small boost to help speed up the colony foundation process.
From past experience the first workers should start emerging in about a months time. If they all succeed in starting colonies then I visualize being able to reduce the price of this species considerably.
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Post by Wood~Ant on Jun 4, 2012 14:30:07 GMT
That sounds like a dream come true, and to see all those nice young newly mated queens, well I'd be lost for words as they are perhaps my most favourite tropical ant species. ;D Great photos Peter. |
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Post by jameslovell on Jun 4, 2012 15:06:29 GMT
Looks similar to Mymrica swarming as there are a few females surrounded by many males.
Well done with the timing.
If you had a large container you could of collected many of them in one go and then seperated them afterwards. Maybe next time perhaps.
Good luck rearing them.
James
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Post by Deleted on Jun 4, 2012 15:23:59 GMT
On June 2nd there was just few diversus flying and I managed to collect four females and about twenty males and placed them all in the same container! The next morning when I checked on them the females had all been fighting and three of them were badly damaged with missing antennae / parts of legs etc hence useless to try and start a colony with. I was left with the one dominant female and the knowledge that you should never place two females in the same container as they will fight! I just consider it fortunate that I learned this the day before the main swarm or I probably wouldn't have many whole females left!!!
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Post by Jenny on Jun 4, 2012 15:43:04 GMT
Is this species a monogynous one then, as it seems like only 1 queen will found a colony and doesn't accept other rivals.  |
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Post by TenebrousNova on Jun 4, 2012 16:45:35 GMT
I have seen a few P.diversus colonies on YouTube that have more than one queen.
They also seem willing to adopt a new one if necessary, like this:
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Post by honeypotant on Jun 4, 2012 17:53:59 GMT
wow they look brilliant  |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 4, 2012 18:10:52 GMT
This is a very interesting read, nice photos and to be lucky enough to view the mating and catch some mated females. I would be interested in seeing more photos of the eggs and larvae.
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Post by Zarbi on Jun 4, 2012 20:36:58 GMT
I wouldn't fancy getting bitten by a soldier of this ant army. Bet those jaws hurt a lot  |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 5, 2012 0:43:38 GMT
From what I have observed when the queens are mated they have two options - they can be accepted back into an established nest or found a colony on their own. All the young colonies that I have ever found only have a single queen and if you put two queens together to try and found a new colony they will fight until one is driven out or killed. It is only after the colony has grown to a large size that they will accept additional queens. Very large colonies can have in the region of 3 to 9 queens maybe more!
Most of the colonies offered for sale that have more than one queen are wild collected and then if several queens are collected with only a few thousand workers the queens will live together without any problems.
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