New Tetramorium Queen!
Found a #tetramorium #antqueen, probably #tetramoriumcaespitum with no wings in #lakewoodwa. #antkeeper #antqueens #ants A post shared by Tichomir Dunlop (@tichomirdunlop) on Jul 22, 2017 at 11:29am PDT I found a new Tetramorium Queen today, already deälated! This morning my mother woke me up to tell me that there was substantial evidence of nuptial flights…
Good footage of Queen E!
I finally copied it over from Google Drive @dr.whex! My iPad unexpectedly shut off, I have stills if needed. #ants #antkeeper #antqueens #eggs A post shared by Tichomir Dunlop (@tichomirdunlop) on Jul 20, 2017 at 1:19pm PDT
iNaturalist projects
I have founded the Antkeeping project and the Ants of North America project on iNaturalist. Both projects are for quite different purposes: Antkeeping is for recording your colonies and queens, nuptial flights, and alates. What it is not for is for generic ant observations. Ants of North America is for any type of ant observation in North…
Five Formica Queens!
Found five 🐜🐜🐜🐜🐜 ant queens on a trip to Eastern Washington outside the Swauk Teanaway Grange, nearby Cle Elum/Ellensburg (Eastern) Washington. Lasius? #identification please! Lasius maybe? #antkeeper #antkeeping #queenants #easternwashington #washington #lasius #id #antloveforever #idrequest A post shared by Tichomir Dunlop (@tichomirdunlop) on Jul 18, 2017 at 6:37pm PDT What did you say? You found…
Queen Check: July 14, 2017
Nothing out of the ordinary. The queen was alive and well, although I still could not tell if there were any larvae yet. I will be gone in Ellensburg for the weekend with the WBA (Washington Butterfly Association) looking for butterflies. 🐛 I have heard that there are a lot of Camponotus in Eastern Washington, so…
Queen Check: July 10, 2017
Nothing out of the ordinary. More clumps of yellow eggs, the queen is actively moving them around the crater in the cotton. There was also possibly a spot of mold visible, but it was hard to tell, and besides, at that point it was very small. It was quite incredible how the pile of yellow eggs…
Is it a queen?
Is it a queen? No really, is it? You’ve found what you believe is an ant queen, but only keep her if you know that she is a queen. It is unkind to keep a worker whose destiny was to live and die for her mother, not to be cooped up in a test-tube on gel…
New book: The Fungus Growing Ants of North America by William Morton Wheeler 1907, 1973 republication
Wonderful book, just came by post today. We ordered it from Barnes & Noble marketplace seller Better World Books and the condition was perfect! Although the copy is more than twenty years old, the pages were not even slightly yellowed. Because the book was written in 1907, some of the terminology is quite outdated. For example,…
Update: Yellow Eggs
On my post Yellow Eggs, I mentioned that I was worried that may be infertile because of the yellow eggs. As usual, I’m wrong. 😅 loyzn from iNaturalist said: No not a problem at all. They can vary in color. And they have different colors depending on their age. Phew! That’s good news! I will be updating…
Genus Sedum “Stonecrop”
On my post yesterday My Tetramorium Queen I was remarking about the little black ants in my yard, which I thought may be Lasius, and mentioned “yellow sprawling succulents,” which I did not know the name of: Now I see them collecting the nectar from the yellow sprawling succulents – of course, that isn’t what they are called, but…
Yellow Eggs?
The day after original Tetramorium queen post: I initially planned on checking on the queen tomorrow, but my father had a family emergency and had to take a last-minute flight to England via Reykjavík on Iceland Air, so I wanted to show him her progress before he left. She was alive and eggs were present, which…
Ant Anatomy
Ant. Featured photo by Bent Tranberg on Flickr. Unlike most insects, ants have four sections: the head, thorax, petiole, and gaster. Normally insects have three: the head, thorax, and abdomen. The head and thorax are the same as in all insects, but what are the petiole and gaster? The gaster is the same as the…
My Tetramorium Queen
My Yard Hello, Internet! For a while now I have looked for ant queens to start ant-keeping. Around my house are very many Tetramorium colonies, ranging from brown-black to bright orange-red. Another common species I see is very small and black, with slightly translucent gasters. That species is smaller than the Tetramorium around my house, and in fact…