The AntsCanada Ant Forum's

Hello everyone, I'm new to ant keeping and recently purchased some stuff from AntsCanada. I'm looking at purchasing some pavement ants and someone said they would sell me 2 queens and workers. My question is..if I put two queens in a formicarium will they kill each other?

Yes, tetramorium (pavement ants) are not polygynous, and will almost definitely kill each other if introduced to each other.

Several Multi-Queened Tetramorium Journals Disapprove That.

The queens are together in a test tube tho.

Falcone43906 wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 20, 2017 7:25 pm

The queens are together in a test tube tho.

I had never heard of anything but if they’re already together just keep them.

Falcone43906 wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 20, 2017 7:25 pm

The queens are together in a test tube tho.

Yeah, I did this experiment. They tolerate each other for a while, then somewhere along the line they kill each other. Here is my journal. The info you are looking for is in the first couple pages.

http://forum.AntsCanada.com/viewtopic.php?f=26&t=1173&hilit=tetramorium+journal+idahoantgirl

You could always try it out, my two queen colony's testube got flooded somewhere in the founding stage and I thought they were dead but it turns out they weren't but threw them away. So I don't know what would have hapenned in that situation.

Falcone43906 wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 20, 2017 7:25 pm

The queens are together in a test tube tho.

If the queens themselves don't kill each other, one queen will still have an unfortunate faith. The workers will choose the queen they like the most, and kill off the other one. I would separate the brood equally amongst both of the queens and put them in their own individual test tubes.
Good luck.

idahoantgirl wrote: ↑

Sat Oct 21, 2017 11:34 am

Falcone43906 wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 20, 2017 7:25 pm

The queens are together in a test tube tho.

You could always try it out, my two queen colony's testube got flooded somewhere in the founding stage and I thought they were dead but it turns out they weren't but threw them away. So I don't know what would have hapenned in that situation.

I did the same thing kinda with my Camponotus castenus colony...she had like 10 workers and I thought they had all died from flooding but after a day, the queen started moving again...they were alive! After I figured I'd not let the nutrients go to waste and have the "dead" workers and brood to my Crematogaster ashmedi colony. Now I just hope she will make it through hibernation so I can get some brood/callow workers from a friend so she can make it...