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Post by UKantz on May 21, 2012 15:13:24 GMT
I'm happy to say that all of the pupae have been adopted, the queens seem to give greater care to these than their own eggs. The pupae can hatch in 1 days time or in 2 weeks time we will have to wait and find out. ;D
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Post by UKantz on May 23, 2012 15:26:14 GMT
pic of the set up I'm using I covered the 3 large airholes with celotape and punched in smaller wholes, I used 3 parts sand 4 parts soil. Attachments:
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Post by UKantz on May 23, 2012 15:28:20 GMT
whole I made for the tubing to connect to the foraging pot Attachments:
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Post by UKantz on May 23, 2012 15:32:48 GMT
complete set up (without tubing) Attachments:
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Post by UKantz on May 23, 2012 16:11:05 GMT
I have just released the queens into the set up and both are exploring as I speak, since I have no tubing I have bunged up the whole in the worm world with some cotton wool.
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Post by UKantz on May 24, 2012 6:29:19 GMT
Last night I left them to explore their habitat but this morning I found them fighting , and not only that condensation had built up in the test tube and some eggs were growing fungus on them. I managed to split the queens up and put them in separate containers however, one of the queens has lost the use of 2 legs and is stumbling around the new test tube. The other I think is ok and I managed to rescue the 5 pupae but not the eggs unfortunately . I don't think the injured queen will have a great enough chance to rebuild from this setback but the other I hope has a chance
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Post by UKantz on May 25, 2012 7:01:28 GMT
The injured queen as I predicted was found dead this morning not only that the other queen isn't looking lively either
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Post by UKantz on May 30, 2012 5:38:06 GMT
Well I released the other queen into the habbitat nest as she had been tearing at the cotton she has been in there for 2 days but hasn't decided to dig, instead just wanders around. I'm not going to give up but I don't expect her to make it. But this journal will continue as very kindly and thoughtfully dean offered to send me 3 Formica lemani queens free of charge ;D I can't thank you enough dean as I realy want to keep Formica but there are none in my area. A quick question to members though, when the 2 queens arrived they had eggs scattered around the test tube I left them in a dark undisturbed place for 4 days. Normally queens gather there eggs up I thought but this didn't seem to be the case as the eggs were still scattered with only 3-4 in a small pile. Does anyone know why they didn't gather there eggs up?
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Post by Wood~Ant on May 30, 2012 6:23:07 GMT
A quick question to members though, when the 2 queens arrived they had eggs scattered around the test tube I left them in a dark undisturbed place for 4 days. Normally queens gather there eggs up I thought but this didn't seem to be the case as the eggs were still scattered with only 3-4 in a small pile. Does anyone know why they didn't gather there eggs up? I think that Dean collects newly mated queens from last years flights, and as young queens only have a certain amount of stored food in the form of fat; and also reabsorb their wing muscles, they can only feed a small number of larvae. They lay lots of eggs, but between 60 and 70% of these are used as food, both for the queens and their new larvae. It is a case of sacrificing some of the brood so that some may develop into worker ants. Queens from older colonies don't have this problem, as they already have a large force of worker daughters to attend to the feeding, foraging and other nest duties. My own 2 remaining queens have only 35% of their brood left, but what they have are fast becoming small larvae; and when the queens have more food available they will soon lay new eggs and although this species doesn't have large colonies, they do very well as my colony from 2010 has done.
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Post by UKantz on May 30, 2012 15:00:17 GMT
Thanks but I don't think this is the case, they didn't seem to take any notice of them which I thought was very strange. Oh well I guess it's one of those mysteries again.....
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Post by deansyme on May 31, 2012 10:22:07 GMT
Occasionally some queens will do this, I suppose its why many do not make it in the wild.
Sent from my U20i using ProBoards
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Post by UKantz on Jun 1, 2012 17:04:08 GMT
Well here is the good news and the bad news. Let's start with the bad, the 2 queen alliance has finally fallen due to the fact the last queen died today, she never started digging just wandered around the habitat. The good news is the colony from dean arrived today and was well packaged as always, it consisted of: 3 queens, 15-20 workers and a stack of around 100-200 eggs. I placed there test tube into a container so they can forage and have already started diceing up the mealworm and have drank up all 3 blobs of honey water I placed in there, all have been passed on to the queens and nurses in the test tube. Once again thank you dean for this great colony I will repay you with my own offering of a queen from the flights this year.
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Post by deansyme on Jun 1, 2012 19:41:28 GMT
Glad they arrived safe They looked a good colony for you and hope they are very successful.
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Post by UKantz on Jun 2, 2012 10:11:06 GMT
This morning 3 workers were found dead but I think it may have been due to the stress of the journey. However this morning I placed them in the worm world nest and they have begun digging, it's amusing to watch the eager queens go to close to the end of the test tube only to be dragged back by nurses.
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Post by UKantz on Jun 4, 2012 16:57:23 GMT
It turns out the workers have been very busy, they have made several chambers and they have fully moved out of their tube. All queens workers and brood are alive and well, I just fed them a small mealworm and some tissue soaked in honey water.
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