My first colony- Monomorium minimum.

[ooper01]

Monomorium minimum lacks sculpting on much of the body (giving them their smooth, shiny appearance), which Tetramorium are in excess of. The rough texture on the head and mesosoma are givaways. Monomorium queens are very slender, with the mesosoma barely half the width of the gaster, when viewed from above. Another detail, although it can't be picked up from the photos, is that Monomorium minimum have no propodeal spines at all, while Tetramorium do have small ones (even the queen). Monomorium queens top out at around 5mm in length.

Well there you have it! It looks like I lied to several people who thought they were buying Monomorium minimum when in fact they bought Tetramorium sp E! Thanks guys!!

[JDSweetMeat]

I hope to see this colony grow as well. Monomorium was one of my target genus but had no luck my first year locating them.

I found too many. My little 7-year old son would come in the house with 2 or 3 and finally I just had to tell him I had enough of these queens. I probably collected 70-80 of them. Some I doubled and tripled up in same test tube. They co-founded the colony, but after nanitics arrived, they killed all but one queen (there is a word for that, can't think it right now).

One time he came in and wanted me to go outside with him. He found a few queens in a small sidewalk seam. We ended up pulling 20 queens out of that one spot! I put them all in one test tube, since they had already become roommates in the sidewalk seam. I think there are just two queens left. The past two or three weeks they have slowly been killing them off.

Maybe I'll create a post on it. I have a short video of two queens going at it.

Are you sure you had Monomorium? Many species of Monomorium are known for having multiple queens. It sounds like you might have misidentified some Tetramorium (which are generally monogynous) as Monomorium (which are generally polygynous). I mean, they are very similar species (physically).

[ooper01]

I have since determined that I have Tetramorium, not Monomorium. It was my first experience identifying queens back then a few years ago.

[sartwell90]

I am about to start my own journal following my C. noveboracensis and T. sp E colonies. I found this to read on what other people are doing and was like... she looks exactly like my queen! I must have misidentified! But then I read further. Funny stuff.

Best of luck with your colony!