Lasius Neoniger?
Moderator: ooper01
Re: Lasius Neoniger?
I think it actually might be Formica. But I'm new, don't take my word for it!
Re: Lasius Neoniger?
That is most likely Lasius neoniger.... but sometimes Lasius alienus flies at the same time and makes everything ten times more confusing. Both can look fairly identical in the right lighting. L. alienus I've found to have a slightly more bullet-shapped gaster, and they're slightly more jumpy and frigidity in captivity, they also hue more towards being a true black tone and sometimes with yellow legs. L. neoniger hues slightly more brown, their gasters are more rounded and similar in shape to a Formica queen in the fusca group. They're also a little bit more relaxed about the occasion knock and slam to their test tube.
When flying L. neoniger swarms tend to stay out in fields, where as L. alienus swarms in woodlands but sometimes this includes part shade areas where the forest might thin out to a park or a wooden suburban area. Both queens will dig in soil to start out, actually you may even chance across dozens of queens all digging out the same hole. In nature the two species tend to keep separate, but in captivity it's easy to mistake them both as the same species and put them together in the same founding tube... where they surprisingly get alone, though the L. alienus queens are more excited when disturbed.
Given the shape and color of your queen this is likely L. alienus but I would never feel confident in that without having a L. neoniger queen to compare her to side by side. If this can't be done, them consider waiting for the first workers before stamping a species name on her. L. neoniger is the more common of the two however, at least more commonly found by anters.
When flying L. neoniger swarms tend to stay out in fields, where as L. alienus swarms in woodlands but sometimes this includes part shade areas where the forest might thin out to a park or a wooden suburban area. Both queens will dig in soil to start out, actually you may even chance across dozens of queens all digging out the same hole. In nature the two species tend to keep separate, but in captivity it's easy to mistake them both as the same species and put them together in the same founding tube... where they surprisingly get alone, though the L. alienus queens are more excited when disturbed.
Given the shape and color of your queen this is likely L. alienus but I would never feel confident in that without having a L. neoniger queen to compare her to side by side. If this can't be done, them consider waiting for the first workers before stamping a species name on her. L. neoniger is the more common of the two however, at least more commonly found by anters.
Re: Lasius Neoniger?
She is a Lasius alienus, she is quite a bit smaller than a neoniger.
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