My new Ant colonies are developing!

This is a two in one post and I am delighted to inform you that two of my newest colonies are developing very well.

A month has passed since the last log for these two colonies, so let’s dive into it.

Lets start with the orange Buniapone amblyops.

As mentioned on the last log, when they arrived they had 1 single larvae and no eggs. And what I did was to combine this colony with another single Buniapone amblops queen I had, which seems to have been well accepted.

I have been feeding this colony very regularly, with baby crushed red runner roaches, rock sugar, or honey water drops and water.

The roaches are quickly taken inside the nest. Normally I give them 2 to 3 baby roaches, and brought into the last chamber, the queen’s chamber, where the larvae is located.

Buniapone amblyops colony feeding

The workers will always cover the excess water or honey water dishes with soil within 24 hours of being put there. It is annoying, but it is also a good way for me to know they have actually fed on it. So it is just a matter of repeating the process over and over again.

And so, yesterday, I found this new pupae inside the Queens chamber.

Buniapone amblyops colony first pupae

And on the opposite side, the pile of eggs hidden from sight, also waiting to hatch.

Buniapone amblyops colony egg pile

So its seems colony is happy and developing well. I have been avoiding any major disturbance, but I have to report that I am not able to find the 2 queens. The way I have the nests setup and their shape doesn’t allow me to see everything. There are some blind spots. And I think that may be the reason why I can’t see them both. I believe one is hiding, but soon I will have to hydrate the nests and will use this opportunity to clean the glasses and do a quick inspection on the worker and queen count.

And now moving on to the resurrected Polyrhachis mitrata colony. And the reason why I say this is because few days ago, when I check on the colony, the Queen was dead.

Polyrhachis mitrata colony feeding

I kid you not. I even turned the test tube around to see if she was really dead, and she was rolling and totally curled up. Nonetheless, I decided to add a little bit of honeywater, as a totally desperate attempt, go figure what I was thinking about….

And the queen sprung to life, and all three went to have a drink! LOL… i was so trolled!

Well done Queen 1 - 0 Martin.

Polyrhachis mitrata colony

I was so relief, I was thinking, oh great, first death report, for no reason whatsoever, and just now that the colony and brood seems to be doing just fine! Not that it didn’t happen before, because it did and way too many times!

So thankfully she is still alive and yesterday as well, I found their first pupae! There are a couple of eggs and another larvae developing. So everything seems to be ok.

Polyhachis mitrata colony first pupae

The only thing that is now on my mind, while I am writing this, is to inspect the condition of this tube, it seems to be more dirty than I have thought/seen. A re-house may be needed soon.

Well, this is all for this quick double update! Hope you have enjoyed, and see on the next one!

Still missing some “entry” logs on my older colonies, hope to be able to finish them before end of the month!

Stay tuned, and thanks for reading.

Cheers!