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Today I stumbled upon a colony of Solenopsis molesta colony in my yard. Before this, I had no other colonies, so I decided to capture the queen and some workers. Otherwise I would have waited until the Formica argentea nuptial flights in June. The queen is full of eggs, there are 8 workers, and about 10 larvae. They are being housed in a test tube setup. So, what should I name this colony? Any suggestions?

Update

I decided to break into the colony again and this time boosted the colony to about 50 workers or so.

The queen and workers escaped!

But don't worry. I caught another colony. This time it has four queens, and around 100 workers. The queens are laying eggs, and the brood piles are growing by the hundreds every day. (Typical Solenopsis molesta egg laying rate)

i have heard solenopsis molesta are very good escape artists

antnest8 wrote: ↑

Wed May 09, 2018 5:12 pm

i have heard solenopsis molesta are very good escape artists

I forgot to water them, and put the top on my container, so most of the workers escaped, (escape artists) and the whole thing dried out and there is only one queen left, but I put more workers inside, so it isn't dead yet!

I caught another colony, but this one had 70 or so queens! I only caught 60 or so, but that's still better than nothing. I named them the Royal Legion, referring to the army of queens.

I have solenopsis fugax colonies which are present in europe but is solenopsis molesta here too ?

Dominik wrote: ↑

Tue May 22, 2018 1:04 pm

I have solenopsis fugax colonies which are present in europe but is solenopsis molesta here too ?

No, they are a North American species.

The Royal Legion has grown so much since the last time I did an update! There has to be at least 1,000 workers and huge balls of brood. I feed them fruit flies and butter. I find that the Royal Legion is ok with accepting new queens, so I will introduce freshly mated queens every year to keep the colony up and running long after it's supposed to die.

Butter? That's a new one. What are you giving them for sugar? I don't think butter has much nutritional value for ants.