I want to thank everyone for their condolences and advice. I suppose I should have explained my situation a bit better though. Even though I wanted this colony to succeed and grow, it is not so terrible that I lost one of my Pogo. colonies. I have more space now to try a different species to keep. Let me say this again though, "I would NEVER purposely harm or destroy a colony simply to try another." I am just making "lemonade out of lemons".
I’ve managed to introduce new queens to colonies, keep feeding the queenless colony, it could still be possible to save them. What you need to do is take the new queen, put her in the fridge for a few hours, and after you take her out, take 5-10 workers from the queenless colony and freeze them in a separate container for 2-5 minutes. Then put the frozen workers into the queens tube and put the queens tube back in the fridge for a few hours, if they are acting like a colony together, the first step is completed. The second step is to take around 1-5 workers from the queenless colony, don’t freeze or put these workers in the fridge, put the workers in the test tube with the queen, if these workers don’t attack the queen or the workers that were frozen, the final step is almost complete, all you have to do now is put the tube into the outworld of the queenless colony, and the queen will move into the nest. I have done a similar technique to this many times with Lasius colonies to introduce new/parasitic queens to colonies. Some people say vinegar works better at removing scent than freezing but idk. The vinegar method would be to dip the new queen in vinegar for a few seconds and then to dry her off, then take a worker from the queenless colony a dip that in the vinegar too and introduce them, then take a worker from the queenless colony without dipping it in vinegar, and put it and the queen with its vinegar worker into the fridge for a few hours and then take the unvinegared worker and introduce it to the queen and it’s worker, if there’s no aggression, take another worker from the queenless colony but don’t put it in the fridge or dip it in vinegar, just put it in the tube, if the 4 get along, put the tube in the outworld of the queenless colony. Both methods have a chance of helping you save your colony.
Yeah, I will not offer them any more seeds, they seem to have enough, but I will continue to offer them water and let them do "their thing" until the final workers passes.
@@JaguarsRegoated Mack at THA may have some. The time of year to get queens is a bit different than a lot of species, I do not know myself. I wish I could be of more help.
I have said this on the THA FB page, if I was collecting my own queens and I had a bunch, I would try to introduce a new queen, but I am not going to purchase one to try this. It is far too risky.
@@sebastianiruretagoyena That is thoughtful of you. I rather someone get the queen and grow a new colony though. I also have to factor that something within the entire colony may have gone wrong, so I am more inclined to let things go and clean out the formicarium.
