ID Please: Caught June 21, 2018 Houston, TX

[akdsjgh]

Hi. This is my first catch ever as I've always wanted to try and start an ant farm from scratch. I actually didn't catch her, she caught me. I'm sitting in my living room playing *** SPAM *** and I felt her crawling up my leg. Saw how big she was and thought, "holy crap, this has to be a queen!" Caught her and stuck her in a test tube and she's been sitting in the dark for the past 3 weeks or so. Just checked and I see some brood. I believe it's a fire ant (sorry, not familiar with proper terms) as those are very common around here. Any help identifying is appreciated. Not sure how long she is as I didn't realize she needed to be measured to help and I'm trying my best to leave her be. These are the best pics I could get with my phone.

June 22
https://imgur.com/YhOLQpK

July 13
https://imgur.com/1en56jC

[Pabloof7]

I believe it is a tetramorium

[MorbidBugg]

ID requests require a size measurement in mm. Please and thank you in advance!

[akdsjgh]

At the time, I didn’t know I needed a measurement. I don’t want to disturb her too much right now but will get one the next time I check on her.

If this is a tetramorium, will I need to feed her during egg laying or can I wait until I move them into a new home?

[JustCliff]

Assuming she is tetramorium she would be fully claustral, meaning she wouldn't benefit from food until she has her first nanitics. I'd wait for 1-3 workers to enclose, or when a worker is hanging out on the cotton waiting.

A small drop of honey when sealing a fully claustral queen in a tube can help encourage her to not pull on cotton / waste energy doing that, and seems to help surviving the founding process. It doesn't sound like yours needed it, I've seen this mostly help camponotus though anyway.

[akdsjgh]

I did my best attempt to measure and she was about 0.5-0.6 cm, which if my conversions are right is 5-6 mm. Here's a picture.

Again, this is best picture my phone can capture this close. Thanks.

[kykel09]

Definitely Tetramorium. Most likely T. caespitum as that is the most common US Tetramorium but this species is so widely diverse that there is no way to guarantee the species.

Tetramorium sp.
http://www.antwiki.org/wiki/Tetramorium

[Batspiderfish]

This is Solenopsis invicta.

[kykel09]

This is Solenopsis invicta.

Interesting. That was definitely a mistake on my part. I'm not as familiar with Solenopsis species because they're not very common where I live. Learning more every day.

[akdsjgh]

Hmmm....couple different opinions here. Is solenopsis invicta clausteral?