Yes, they are carpenter ants which I am treating as pets. I am not a fan of the odorus ants (Tapinoma) that invade my house every spring, but I find the larger carpenter ants interesting enough to keep. I caught the queen during her nuptial flight and let her found a colony in a test tube last spring. Once she had her second batch of workers I moved her into a formicarium. The first batch are raised on stores from her own body while she starves, the second batch is raised on food brought home by the first batch. Because of this the first batch of workers, called nanitics, are underfed and stunted while the second batch are larger both in body size and number. Basically the colony is very fragile until they have the numbers built up so you have to wait to move them out of their test tube. There are forums just like this one for people who keep ants as pets. There is also an overly dramatized youtube channel called AntsCanada where the owner gets enough money from people watching his videos that he can live off it.
