Queen Central Coast, NSW, Australia 21/10

[SHERWIN]

Caught this queen at work and she's happily laying in my tube set up so I'd like to figure what kind of nest she would like and diet etcetera. Shes about 10mm +/- 2 I had trouble measuring her sorry,. Ive got a album of photos here https://imgur.com/a/pf9cI any help would be greatly appreciated.

And if anyone can explain how I can I'd ants on my own that would be great

[Batspiderfish]

A dolichoderine queen, probably Iridomyrmex.

http://forum.AntsCanada.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2166

If I had any advice for learning to ID ants, it would be to learn your subfamilies and work your way down. By looking at where here gaster attaches to the mesosoma (only one petiole node), I can tell that she is not in the Myrmicinae subfamily. The lack of an acidepore at the tip of her gaster tells me that she is not in Formicinae, but Dolichoderinae. Iridomyrmex is one of the few genera in that subfamily which will get that big, although I am not terribly familiar with Australian ants.

[Lukestewart]

Looks exactly like my irodomyrmex that I've been catching. Mine are 11mm and have yellowish/grey rings on the gaster.

[Mdrogun]

Caught this queen at work and she's happily laying in my tube set up so I'd like to figure what kind of nest she would like and diet etcetera. Shes about 10mm +/- 2 I had trouble measuring her sorry,. Ive got a album of photos here https://imgur.com/a/pf9cI any help would be greatly appreciated.

And if anyone can explain how I can I'd ants on my own that would be great

i just wanted to point out that you did an incredible job taking so many pics. I agree with BatSpiderFish that this is Iridomyrmex

[Aussie]

Looks exactly like mine which I think is a Meat Ant...