My queen has abandoned her eggs. Help.

[EerieEcho]

This was the set up I had her in before she began to act strangely. I did not have a big enough test tub at the time so I shimmied together some spare objects to make it livable for her. The test tube is full of water, the purple bit was to keep light at a minimum even when I peeked in to check on her. But she did lay five eggs in there, and she would never clump them together, so right off the bat we had issues with her, and then her mentality just went from sporadic egg laying to losing the ability to care for her eggs or even walk. Hope this helps!

https://imgur.com/a/ekNFpIF

[AntsLuxembourg]

First. The ants I had in that setup of mine were Messor Barbarus and yeah I also had bonded with the queen because I like the colony and she was laying so many eggs and such but she just randomly died :C
The workers were moving her arround although she wasn't all crumbled up. She just didn't move anymore. Not even after I removed her with my twizzers. I might go and get me a new messor barbarus colony if I find a gan farmer who got a queen.

The other queens I have are all Lasius niger and I am very lucky because they are all fertile. I haven't got a single one which hasn't got no eggs inside the testtube. some of them have so many eggs it looks as if they had laid like 50 eggs inside their. My appartment is very good isolated from outside from sound and temperature and the room is always pretty much darkened. So my ants can chill inside their tubes. I usually do check on the queens once a day if they are all new like just caught that day
But I also just use the light of my phone which isn't set to max brightness and also not shined on the queens directly. I will keep two of the queens since I have kind of bonded with the last queen I caught and with the one I had put inside my old queens testtube, which is the testtube from a fellow gan farmer. ;D

Well now about your setup. Where did you get that purple bottle from and what was inside before you attached it? How did you clean that bottle?

[EerieEcho]

I got it from a local store, it was a small spray bottle for travel size, but I modified it to be able to connect the test tube. Nothing was inside as it was an empty bottle, and as such I never really cleaned it out since yes it was new, and it had no dust on it anywhere. The water was clean bottled water, the cotton had not been exposed to anything as they too were new, Even the test tube was replaced when I moved her into the set up. I figured she was cozy enough too as she immediately started to lay eggs when she was inside! But then a week later this happened

Also, are these ants semi-claustral? Can they have multiple queens in a colony? This species is new to me.

[AntsLuxembourg]

The questions about semi claustral and the amount of queens is depending on the species itself. About the bottle, you should always at least wash it out with water. Usually they come straight from the factory which means that they might haven't been washed out with hot water or normal water. I have no idea what brand it is but I think it's always best to at least wash them out yourself 4-6 times. Like fill in some water, close the top/hold it closed with your finger then shake it to have the water all over the place inside the bottle then spill it out and redo. It's always a precaution to avoid issues with left over chemicals or poisonous left overs. I also just though of something else.

Is it possible, that your queen needs some fresh air? Like is the setup 100% closed so no air can enter or exit? Usually the setup is opened somewhere like the testtube lets a little bit of air through the cotton so perhaps check on that. Also, could you tell me if the queen is still moving somehow or reacts to exposure to direct bright light?

[EerieEcho]

I'm pretty sure I have Lasius niger queens as well, which is why I asked you since you also have lasius niger. I can send pictures if you want as I am proud of my haul from work (10 queens, three perished, so now I have seven queens and two live males that have survived a week now, yay me).

As for the set up, there are holes poked in the tape where the connection is, so air was able to get in and out. And I will remember that next time to prevent this. It's torture to watch the mystery of ant death :/ As for movement, the only thing that she can now move is her head and the most front left leg, though the movements are more twitches and less moving, which means she is alive but barely. No mites on her, no sign of dehydration as she has water present daily. I have very little hope, but the fact that she is even still moving is shocking. She also cannot open her mandibles, they are clamped shut.

[AntsLuxembourg]

What you could try is, take her out of the setup and if you have something like a pippet or a syringe (with or without the needle) try dropping some water over her. Perhaps she got covered in some kind of liquid which has hardened over her body preventing her from moving properly. If she is barely alive it won't really do much damage so this is basicly the only hope left to perhaps bring her back to a much more lifefull state. Also by puring the water over her this way she won't get hurt by the force of the water pressing onto her body. You can place her on a piece of cloth so the water get's sucked in which will prevent the queen from drowing.

About the lasius niger I only had a short period during which I had my first colony since the queen died like 2-3 months later :C

Well I will have to care much better for the new queens I have so they survive new years eve and make it to 2019.

[EerieEcho]

I will have to give this a try, anything to try and help even a little bit. Also I'm sorry to hear about that and I wish you luck with your new queens! I also decided to try and be smart, last night I took the two remaining males and am now cycling them through the test tubes of queens without eggs, if they die they mated which is my hope, but now I have to cycle them around every day, and if they are alive by the end I at least know that either they mate in-flight, or the queens are already full of eggs.

[EerieEcho]

I just went to check on her after her bath (she had moved her antennae once, and now there is no movement at all, not even in contact with light. I think she might be gone

Also! I am now preeeeetty sure my ant girls are tetramorium sp.e. And since four queens are now laying eggs, anyone happen to want one or two? XD I can't keep them all, though that would be pretty cool. If they all get to worker stage I may sell them on GAN if they let me. How much would I even think to sell them for? I figured 10 bucks but that's just me :/

[EerieEcho]

It is confirmed, Victoria is dead. And as an added bonus, I know what killed her now. Only a day after I wrote, fungus was using her body as a garden! She had a fungal infection

[AntsLuxembourg]

Damn. So that was why she was still moving arround for so long. :C
I'm sorry man. But at least it wasn't your fault.