What is this worker species?

[PoorSomaliMan]

https://goo.gl/photos/S1AvPWTi4mp5YB8o7 these four photos

[Martialis]

Formica sp.

[xTNxANTMANx]

Formica sp.

Are you sure? It kind of resembles the Camponotus castaneus workers I have around my house. I can't really see the thorax good though to distinguish it between the two

[Martialis]

Are you sure? It kind of resembles the Camponotus castaneus workers I have around my house. I can't really see the thorax good though to distinguish it between the two

Yes. If you look at the mesosoma, you can see two "humps" instead of the one found on Camponotus.

[xTNxANTMANx]

That's what I was looking for...i can't really make it out though from these pictures. You are probably right though.

[PoorSomaliMan]

Are these guys hard to dig up and find the queen of? I've found four queens of little species

[PoorSomaliMan]

They are found in the southern U.S in Oklahoma.

[Aquaexploder]

Digging up a pre-existing colony is unethical. You should try to find queens during nuptial flights.

[PoorSomaliMan]

How is it unethical? I make sure not to harm any ants

[Batspiderfish]

As opposed to capturing a foundress queen that was unlikely to have survived anyways, capturing a colony that's two or three years old (and has mostly survived the hardest parts of its lifecycle) has a greater ecological impact. Not only do wild-raised colonies have a difficult time surviving in captivity, but the effort used in collecting them is much greater, whilst there is no guarantee that you will find the queen or that she will survive. It's like collecting a wildflower instead of taking a single seed (we shouldn't even do this, in some cases -- it's just an analogy).