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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2012 16:58:17 GMT 1
Here’s a question? I heard that a Queen will live roughly about 10-15 years, so say you have a colony and you only have one queen, and she dies for whatever reason, is there any way you can just put a new queen in there? Obviously of the same species
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2012 17:06:11 GMT 1
Usually? No. I don't think all queens live that long anyway, just some species. But generally, you put a queen from the same species but a different colony, she'll likely be torn apart.
There are some exceptions. SOME ants take their queens back into a colony after it's nested, but these are wood ants that live in the jungle etc and I think the norm with ants is the opposite.
Some ants, like the Green-head ants in Aus, have such poor scent receptors that they have trouble noticing rival colonies. Once I accidentally put two different colonies together and they just got along! So it could be possible but man, I'd doubt it : (
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2012 17:45:19 GMT 1
So that means then it would be the end of the colony? or could you take a princess from the colony mate her with male and then put her back to rule the hive? would that be possible?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2012 18:46:15 GMT 1
Saddly no that is not possible they would kill her. The colony is saddly doomed.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2012 19:02:49 GMT 1
Wow, that's a little Rubish, i would have thought that a new queen would have taken over been born to take over, so the colony would just slowly wither out as no new blood would ever come to rejuvenate it?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2012 19:36:07 GMT 1
Bees do that, but ants usually don't. You can introduce new queens to queen-less colonies; it's just not often successful. In general, an ant colony is more akin to a single organism than a society: the queen is the only carrier of the genetic code. Her sterile, partial clones keep her alive like what your cells do for you. Nature would more often have the queen and her "body" die rather than be replaced by a queen with potentially inferior genes.
Keep in mind, though, that usurpation is a founding strategy for many ants. Social parasites are designed for such an opportunity to take over an orphaned body and begin a colony of a different species.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 2, 2012 19:56:57 GMT 1
Wow that pretty cool, never though of a ant colony as a singular organism, nice post
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Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2012 5:38:34 GMT 1
Yeah a colony is really best described as an organism in my opinion. And no the workers wouldn't take her on to help rejuvenate life, that would weed out competitiveness in the natural fight for survival and potentially contravene the necessary attitude towards survival of the fittest
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Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2012 6:19:27 GMT 1
My mind just blew up! ><
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Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2012 14:21:45 GMT 1
yer mine too, would be very interesting to try and re-queen a colony though, so what about multi queened colony's? can they be re-queened much easier?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 3, 2012 14:38:18 GMT 1
It differs from species to species, but multi-queen colonies tend to either begin with an alliance between queens or through the re-acceptance of mated daughters from that colony.
Don't get me wrong -- just because ant colonies favor dying off rather than accepting new genes doesn't mean this doesn't happen. It's plausible that social parasites evolved from queens who were apt at negotiating their way into existing colonies. Simply keep in mind that it is a very serious situation for the queen and the orphaned workers.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 11, 2012 9:13:24 GMT 1
Multi-queen colonies usually derive from the same 'parent', so to speak, so they all are recognised as family. So yeah, they'd be easier to re-queen as long as they are from a colony that is also descended I'd imagine? Only guessing though.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 11, 2012 15:03:45 GMT 1
I disagree; queens from the same colony aren't required for a polygynous founding. That rule only applies to colonies who accept newly-mated queens back into the nest.
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Post by Deleted on Oct 11, 2012 22:33:16 GMT 1
So this would only work in polygynous colony's?
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Post by Deleted on Oct 12, 2012 2:34:46 GMT 1
Polygynous means "multiple queens", so yes.
There is, additionally, pleometrosis (where queens found a colony together, but later die off until there is only one) and oligogyny (where two queens are supported by the same colony, but will try to kill each other if they ever meet).
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