A few weeks ago, I found a Crematogaster queen on a sidewalk. After placing her in a test tube nest, I provided her with some honey, since the queen looked tired, presumably from running around searching for a nest site. At first, she didn’t produce brood, which is unsurprising since in the wild these queens often hibernate, laying eggs in Spring. Recently, I had a look at her and noticed a small clutch of three eggs. Today she has roughly 12 eggs, give or take a couple. Given the cluster of eggs, this queen may be well on her way to starting a colony
