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Post by Black Ant on Sept 17, 2015 13:50:35 GMT
For the money it looks like you've got a nice perdy colony there Wood. The 3 workers are small enough to be first workers, so the queen may have been mated this year perhaps?
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Post by Wood~Ant on Sept 17, 2015 14:07:46 GMT
For the money it looks like you've got a nice perdy colony there Wood. The 3 workers are small enough to be first workers, so the queen may have been mated this year perhaps? Fingers crossed it will grow into a big colony. I have kept this species before in soil but they seem to do better in a dry nest, so the acrylic should be more like living in wood chambers.
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Post by Wood~Ant on Oct 19, 2015 7:09:18 GMT
Camponotus singularis colony should be posted from Scotland today, so I will make a journal once they get here, which hopefully will be tomorrow.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 29, 2015 8:35:09 GMT
Very nice singularis colony you have there Wood ![:)](http://www.cosgan.de/images/more/bigs/c015.gif)
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Post by Deleted on Oct 29, 2015 17:10:43 GMT
Very nice singularis colony you have there Wood ![:)](http://www.cosgan.de/images/more/bigs/c015.gif) One of my favorite species - the queens are a very good size. Would be very interested to hear if anyone else has kept this species and done any experiments on introducing workers from a different colony? All the Camponotus species that I have kept have always attacked any introduced workers from another colony. The only time I managed to combine workers from two different colonies was from a consignment (from an infamous China dealer) of so called newly mated queens. These colonies all died out without the queens ever laying any eggs - I strongly suspected that the so called new queens were just female alates with their wings removed and all from the same mother colony hence the reason the workers did not fight when combined! Mine never laid a single egg and the so called queens all died within about 10-14 days. Most true Camponotus queens will start laying within about a week after settling down and given ample food.
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Post by Wood~Ant on Oct 29, 2015 19:09:45 GMT
Very nice singularis colony you have there Wood ![:)](http://www.cosgan.de/images/more/bigs/c015.gif) One of my favorite species - the queens are a very good size. Would be very interested to hear if anyone else has kept this species and done any experiments on introducing workers from a different colony? All the Camponotus species that I have kept have always attacked any introduced workers from another colony. The only time I managed to combine workers from two different colonies was from a consignment (from an infamous China dealer) of so called newly mated queens. These colonies all died out without the queens ever laying any eggs - I strongly suspected that the so called new queens were just female alates with their wings removed and all from the same mother colony hence the reason the workers did not fight when combined! Mine never laid a single egg and the so called queens all died within about 10-14 days. Most true Camponotus queens will start laying within about a week after settling down and given ample food.
This is a concern of mine, as these ants all came from China and if the collector picked up new queens from the same nest, were they properly mated or just ones with their wings removed? The fact that workers from different queens met with no aggression may mean they all came from the same colony.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 29, 2015 19:39:17 GMT
You should know quite soon. If the colony is kept in good conditions (which I am sure yours are) the queen should start laying soon - if there are no eggs within about ten days then treat her as suspect! Keep them nice and warm as this will speed up any egg laying.
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Post by Wood~Ant on Oct 30, 2015 8:41:38 GMT
You should know quite soon. If the colony is kept in good conditions (which I am sure yours are) the queen should start laying soon - if there are no eggs within about ten days then treat her as suspect! Keep them nice and warm as this will speed up any egg laying. What temperature would you suggest is best Peter, as at the moment they are kept around 21 to 23 Celsius. Food is no problem and the nest is kept damp enough to create some humidity.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 30, 2015 17:31:56 GMT
The ideal would be between 80-85 Fahrenheit for the brood chamber and a bit less elsewhere to create a gradient. (Centigrade ?) If the temp is less then it will obviously just slow things down a bit.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 13, 2015 4:27:22 GMT
Any eggs yet?
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Post by Jenny on Nov 13, 2015 6:28:54 GMT
All alive, but no eggs.
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Post by elitzchupa on Feb 14, 2016 19:48:37 GMT
Are we able to get a few photos of your camponotus herculeans in their new soil set up? That would we great to see.
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Post by Jenny on Feb 14, 2016 20:03:04 GMT
I'll see what I can do Elitz, depending what the camera can see without too much disturbance. ![:)](http://www.cosgan.de/images/more/bigs/c015.gif)
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Post by Wood~Ant on Feb 15, 2016 13:52:59 GMT
Are we able to get a few photos of your camponotus herculeans in their new soil set up? That would we great to see. Owing to the plastic not allowing good camera focus, this is the best we could get for now. ![](http://s11.postimg.org/509ze1b33/P1010012.jpg) ![](http://s22.postimg.org/wgmkh35z1/P1010014.jpg) ![](http://s10.postimg.org/6s2axo5j9/P1010016.jpg)
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Post by antaholic on Mar 4, 2016 9:53:04 GMT
Nice to see your singularis queen has laid eggs at last, as I did wonder if she had just had her wings removed and wasn't mated as Peter said. Love the 2 new videos
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