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Post by Deleted on Jul 9, 2012 15:59:03 GMT 1
I finally found a nest with virgin queens visible. I was walking home and spotted a colony of L.Niger, I had a quick look and managed to spot loads of winged males and females. Hopefully the flights will be soon so I can catch some! I guess due to the heavy rain the workers have been hiding the to protect them which is why I haven't seen any until now - it had me worried all my local colonies had stopped production of winged ants ;D
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Post by Deleted on Jul 10, 2012 20:48:46 GMT 1
Sounds like it might be imminent! I've got my plastic collecting pots ready...
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Post by Deleted on Jul 16, 2012 16:23:16 GMT 1
I think due to the weather, particularly in the south-east of the U.K ant flights won't happen until its a really hot day... The rain we've had here is unreal and I think it has caused the nuptial flights to be postponed until there is significant heat to encourage a mating flight. I lifted up a large slab in my garden and the queens are still in pupae form, the colder weather I think has also reduced growth rates within colonies, dare I say we could be having flights in August!? I did find a Lasius niger queen at Hastings yesterday, just the one though, couldn't find anymore, perhaps an early emerger! She's safely away in a dark test tube now
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Post by Deleted on Jul 16, 2012 17:56:34 GMT 1
Actually I'm in Norfolk, and my rubra have only just created their drones and they're still inside, and in the schoolgrounds we found a queen cocoon of a black ant colony inside our wildlife garden, so I don't know if they've flown here yet either. I've been strolling about the school walkway in the lunch hour every day and I see lots of ant hive enterances but no sign of flights yet. Dunno if that helps much....
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Post by Deleted on Jul 17, 2012 17:02:13 GMT 1
Do you mean ant nests (not hives) The lasius niger near me have alates
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Post by Deleted on Jul 27, 2012 7:51:16 GMT 1
On monday, I caught 3 queens! 2 were still alates, but one is a dealate! It's got about 20+ eggs now and i've seen her laying sometimes. The alates and dealate are in the same nest together, because alates won't try killing their queen. I also got a male ant.
On monday only a couple of colonies flew. BBC have got some thing about ants and what weather they all fly at. This is what my dad told me ;D
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Post by Deleted on Jul 27, 2012 18:46:47 GMT 1
Myrmica Rubra Have flown in scotland, In the past 3 days there has been quite a few!
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