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Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Sun Jul 30, 2017 3:21 pm
by AntsManhattan
Hi, my name is Joe Koza and I am a new ant keeper. I caught my first queen(a Camponotus queen) on July third, and it took me a while to get my account set up. I live in Manhattan(as my username would suggest) and my family has a house in Saugerties, which is where I found the queen. She has 6 or 7 eggs. I also found another queen last week. I’m not sure what species she is, but she is 1 cm, is a reddish-orange color and has a large gaster and a small head. She has 14 eggs. I will post some pictures soon, but if you have any idea what she is then I would appreciate it very much if you told me. Thanks for reading, and I will keep you updated! :)

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Sun Jul 30, 2017 3:22 pm
by AntsManhattan
This is my first post. I am new to ant keeping so if I am doing anything wrong please tell me :D

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Thu Aug 10, 2017 10:52 am
by AntsManhattan
Hi again. i am on vacation in Texas visiting some relatives. Before we left I checked on my queens. Queen #1, my C. pennsylvannicus queen, has more eggs. Queen #2, probably a formica queen, has some brood now!!!! I'm so excited and I hope they both have mated. So a few days ago I was in my Aunt and Uncle's pool. It was raining last night, and I knew there was a nuptial flight because I saw some dead male ants. I was looking around and I saw some queens and males floating in the pool. Most of them were alive, so I saved as many as I could and let them go in some bushes. I found 2 queens and 3 males. They were Solenopsis, and I would have taken them home, but its against the law to bring queen ants to other states :( . I hope to see some leafcutter ants while i'm in Texas and my cousin said he saw some once. Thanks for reading!

AntLoveForever!

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Sun Aug 13, 2017 2:05 pm
by AntsManhattan
Yesterday I got back from Texas and I saw that queen#1's eggs have also hatched and one of queen#2's larvae have pupated! :D

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Sun Aug 13, 2017 2:39 pm
by AqdasHassaan
Nice nice. Would love to see some pics as well..

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Tue Aug 29, 2017 10:48 am
by Gavinthesheep1234567
Love seeing fellow beginners
Keep us updated

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Mon Sep 04, 2017 1:51 pm
by AntsManhattan
Sorry I haven't posted for a long time. I have a lot to catch you up on. First a few weeks ago I caught two more queens, (they were C. novaboracensis) both in some rotting logs. Unfortunately, I used glass test tubes from a chemistry set, and my brother accidentally knocked them over. One of them was killed, :( but I saved the other and put the brood I saved in her test tube. A week later I peeled some of the bark off a root of a tree stump in our backyard. In there I saw a queen with brood and workers! I got the queen, one worker and the brood in a test tube. They were really small, the worker was only a few mm. and the queen was slightly smaller than my formica queen who is 1 cm. They have 2 petiole. Iv'e narrowed the species down to Crematogaster, Monomorium, Pheidole, Temnothorax or Trichomyrmex. If any of you know what species she might be, please tell me. Sorry again that I took so long to post this :lol: .

AntLoveForever!

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Mon Sep 04, 2017 4:28 pm
by Gavinthesheep1234567
Pics would help

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Mon Sep 11, 2017 5:53 pm
by AntsManhattan
Gavinthesheep1234567 wrote:
Mon Sep 04, 2017 4:28 pm
Pics would help
i haven't been able to post pics

Re: Joe's Ant Journal

Posted: Wed Nov 01, 2017 5:03 pm
by AntsManhattan
sorry it's been so long, i haven't had much to update on. Most of the ants are hibernating. I'm trying to disturb them as little as possible at this time, but some of the test tubes are moldy. Queen #1 is pulling at the cotton, and I was wondering if this was a problem. If so, what should I do?

Thanks for reading!

AntLoveForever
:D