Colony name: Currently unnamed
Species: Formica sanguinea
Queen: Currently unnamed
The queen and some of her workers. You can just see some brood under the workers.
This colony is growing slowly but surely. As with my smaller colonies in the past though, they’re quite fussy when it comes to protein. They turn their antennae up at anything “wormy” (think morio worm segments) but love flies. Perhaps it’s to do with the exoskeleton? I need to source a good supplier for curly-winged flies for them.
The queen is doing well. She’s active but hasn’t been laying many eggs. I try not to peek into the nest more than once a fortnight or so as younger colonies, particularly of Formica species, seem to get upset by this. Lasius don’t seem to mind too much. Maybe it’s because they seem to be less fast and “dashy” than Formica species? Anyway, she did seem to have some brood, so the plan is to offer plenty of protein to help encourage egg laying and brood raising. I’ve seen as many as two (of the six) workers out foraging at any one time. They seem to do that mostly in the mornings, so I try to dump in a few flies early on in the day. I’m feeding around 1-6 fruit flies a day.