Camponotus vicinus Species Introduction
Claustral. She needs no food during founding, so seal the tube and leave her alone until 'nanitics' appear. In the wild, nests are occasionally started by several dealate queens together. Whether co-founding queens tolerate one another once workers arrive has not been established for this species, and we recommend founding them singly.
A western ant, running from southern British Columbia and Alberta into northwestern Mexico and east to the Dakotas and western Texas, up to 2,960 meters. Habitat is open country rather than closed forest: sagebrush, pinyon-juniper, ponderosa pine and cottonwood along water. Almost every nest is in soil under a stone, with chambers spread under a series of rocks linked by tunnels. Minors run 7 to 8.5mm and majors 11 to 13mm, usually black with a red mesosoma and legs. Foraging is nocturnal, much of it on aphids, and the start is slow: wild first-year nests average four workers. The 2023 reference genome shows this is not one ant but a complex holding cryptic species.
A large, calm, slow-burning carpenter ant for a keeper who is not in a hurry. Camponotus vicinus founds quietly, spends a first year you can count on your fingers, then picks up properly in the second season. The majors are worth the wait. Winter is where these colonies are lost. Skipping diapause, or giving a high-elevation queen a token few weeks of cool, stalls a colony and eventually ends it.
Formicarium
They are ground nesters, not wood nesters. The wild nest is a shallow spread of chambers under a stone rather than a gallery bored into timber, so a Substratum Sand Ant Nest suits them better than anything arboreal. Give horizontal room ahead of depth and expect several small chambers instead of one central gallery. A fluon barrier is worth keeping current, as majors are large and climb well.
Water & Humidity
Moderately humid with a dry top. In the wild the surface under the stone bakes while the chambers below stay damp, and colonies pick the more mesic pockets within otherwise dry sagebrush and pinyon-juniper country. Water one end of the nest and leave the warm end dry. A nest that is damp end to end is the usual way Camponotus brood is lost.
Recommended to use TrapJaw Labs PVA sponges during founding for improved success rates and more nanitics. Once the colony is out of the tube, it wants less moisture than that.
Keep a liquid feeder with water (distilled, purified, or spring) in the foraging area at all times. With the top of the nest kept dry, the outworld is where they drink, and a colony working a sugar feeder hard goes through water faster than most keepers expect.
Carbohydrates
Carbohydrates dominate. These ants tend aphids heavily in the wild, working colonies on the ground and up in vegetation, and honeydew is what a growing nest actually runs on. We recommend providing sugar-water (we use our Ant Nectar Mix) and fresh-water liquid feeders in the outworld at all times. How hard they work that feeder is the best early read on how the colony is doing.
We recommend providing our Honeydew Honey once a week. It replicates the micronutrient profile of the carbohydrate sources bicolored carpenter ants feed on in the wild, and for an ant that spends its nights working aphid colonies that is close to the real thing. Please note that honey-water is not suitable for use in liquid feeders and should only be provided in feeding dishes or on top of sliced, organic apple.
Run one feeder on sugar-water and a second on plain water, and check both daily once the colony is past its first winter. They do not ration.
Protein
Light, and light on purpose. Camponotus carry a gut symbiont (Blochmannia) that supplements their diet and recycles nutrients, so they need far less protein than most ants. What C. vicinus want is variety rather than volume. They are scavengers and predators as much as honeydew farmers, and the classic field result is that they come readily to liver baits, the more rotten the better. Demand climbs while larvae are growing and drops away in the weeks before diapause.
TrapJaw Labs feeds our Camponotus colonies with pre-killed Drosophila melanogaster and D. hydei fruit flies, cockroach nymphs, and sliced mealworms. Termites are readily accepted across the genus and are worth reaching for if a colony stops taking other feeder insects. Given how strongly this species comes to carrion in the field, small pieces of meat are also worth trying, offered sparingly and cleared the same day.
One to two times per week. Increase amounts to scale with brood development.
Maintenance
Week 1: Seal her in a test tube with a PVA sponge, keep it dark and in the mid to high 70s, and do not open it. No food is needed. Spring-caught queens often sit on a small batch of eggs for several weeks before larvae show, and that wait is normal rather than a sign of a failing queen.
Weeks 8–12: First workers appear. Start a sugar feeder straight away and offer small protein items once or twice a week. Expect very little to happen. Wild first-year nests average four workers, and a heated captive colony will beat that comfortably while still looking static beside a Pheidole. Slow is what this species does.
Months 2+: Growth accelerates noticeably after the first full diapause, and majors begin showing up once the colony is past roughly 20 workers. Move them up when about 75% of the nest space is in use, favoring horizontal room over depth, since the wild colony spreads across several chambers rather than digging one deep gallery. Keep the sugar feeder running whenever they are out of diapause.
Diapause is required for this species. Brood and reproductives are absent from wild nests between roughly November and February across most of the range. We recommend 10–14 weeks starting in late October, with the length keyed to where your stock was collected rather than to the species: low-elevation California ants can take the short end, while Rocky Mountain and Intermountain West populations above 2,000 meters want the full period. Remove supplemental heat but keep liquid food and water sources fully-stocked. A mini fridge, wine cooler, or insulated garage holding 38–50°F all work.
Care Summary
- Diapause is MANDATORY, 10–14 weeks at 38–50°F
- Match the diapause length to where the queen was collected
- Sugar feeder stocked at all times, it drives the growth
- Protein 1–2×/week, scaled to brood
- Gradient 72–82°F, damp deep end, dry warm end
- Watch where they park the brood, that is your real thermometer