Greetings, ant lovers, and happy new year
and new decade 2020! The whole world is starting a fresh new page,
and indeed so is our great collection of ants, creatures, and vivarium kingdoms we’ve all
come to love on this channel. So to start off the year right, I asked if
you guys wanted a full pet and Ant Room tour so that all you watching whether you be a
returning AC Family, or a newcomer could be caught up on all the awesome, beautiful, frightening,
and bizarre creatures living with me under my care. It’s also an update video on all of your
favourite ant colonies that you might not have heard from in awhile, as well as arachnids,
reptiles, amphibians, and birds that have appeared on the channel before, and just a
spoiler, there are even several creatures you guys don't know about yet! There are also some ant colonies that sadly
are no longer with us, and issues with some that I need to talk to you about! We’ve got a lot of work to do today, and
this episode is full of surprises, familiar faces, and all the nature you guys love in
our usual 4K UHD footage, so grab some popcorn, sit back, and let’s get started with our
exclusive 2020 AC tour of the animals and biological worlds of our Antiverse, here on
the AntsCanada ant channel! Please SUBSCRIBE to the channel and hit the
BELL icon. Welcome to the AC Family! Enjoy! Starting from the extreme left of the Ant
Room, we begin our tour with one of the coolest of ant worlds, I’ve ever created for one
of the oldest ant colonies on the channel. Behold the kingdom of the Dark Knights, our
OG super colony of black crazy ants. So for those of you who haven’t seen the
Dark Knight’s new terrarium here yet, it’s a multi-species terrarium with millipedes,
spiders, bagworms, and other creatures inside that all depend on each other. The Dark Knights love this vivarium and have
set up their nest within this driftwood hollow. This colony which I’ve owned for about 4
yrs now is unique in that it can self perpetuate pretty much forever, with the colony creating
hundreds of queens which can mate with their male siblings safely without the dangers of
genetic inbreeding happening. They’re an awesome colony that I look forward
to keeping for decades and decades to come! By the way, you guys officially voted and
named this kingdom of the Dark Knights the Dark Forest. Now speaking of multiple queens, we move on
now to the grand palace known as Olympus, home to the Titans, my multi-queen colony
of Asian Marauder ants. These ants are definitely one of my favourites
due to the size of their supermajors which are just massive! The Titans are doing well and have since changed
the landscape and killed off a few plants during renovations. They come to the surface is huge numbers to
feed. I’m thinking of possibly rehoming these
powerful ants into something larger soon. Now let’s move on to one of the newest members
of the Antiverse whom some of you may or may have not seen in a recent video. Welcome to Cerulean Hallow, home of our new
Sapphire Gooty Tarantula. She's loving her new home and we’ll have
a look at her in a second. The plants within her territories are thriving
well, but she’s killed the ones on the wall. I can tell she’s been busy because she's
webbed up the entire entrance of her hallow. From the back, we see her there crawled up
snuggly at the bottom. By the way, guys, she needs an official name
so grab your voting fingers and click on this icard here to vote for her official name. Thank you AC Council for your input! Next is a creature I’ve owned for about
2 yrs now but haven’t told you guys about. Sorry, but I was waiting for just the right
time! AC Family, meet my young Mexican Fireleg Tarantula,
known scientifically as Brachypelma boehmei. She’s actually been in the background of
many episodes on this channel and I’m surprised you guys never asked about her. She's 3 inches long and has a huge appetite! Let’s feed her this superworm now, shall
we? There you go! She’ll grow to a hefty 6+ inches. Though she’s been a silent resident of the
Ant Room for years, she still doesn’t have a name, as well. What should we name her? Leave your name suggestions in the comments. And now moving on to what is arguably the
most famous ant colony on this channel, the Fire Nation, my savage colony of fire ants. I can easily say these stinging aggressive
ants have been the most challenging and fulfilling ants I’ve ever kept through the years. This paludarium created to simulate the Amazon
is called La Selva de Fuego and is full of thick tropical foliage and a river which is
home to a colony of cherry shrimp, snails, mosquito rasbora fish, and even vampire crabs. Mosses have started to grow and attach in
several places! Somewhere beneath all the vegetation the Fire
Nation lives. Today, they dine on sweet jelly and this dead
giant Madagascar hissing cockroach. Now this dead roach came from my new Madagascar
Hissing cockroach colony, yes, yet another colony of critters I haven’t yet shown you
guys on the channel. I’ve owned this roach colony for the past
couple of months now and they’re housed in this simple plastic critter crawler, where
they eat a variety of veggies and fruits. These giant roaches are not to be confused
with my Dubia roaches, which I’ve been using as feeders for years. These roaches don’t have wings, not even
the males. I plan on making them a naturalistic setup
just like Roachella, but perhaps a bit more lavish seeing as I plan on keeping these roaches
more as pets, and perhaps only feed dead members off. Would you guys like to see a video on these
neat hissing cockroaches soon? Next, a couple weeks ago we made this Ant
Terrarium in a Bottle, and as expected the ants have remodeled our masterpiece to make
it fit for an ant colony. The Trap-jaw ants inside are doing super well
and I just love them! This terrarium was the product of a challenge
collab with another Youtuber friend Serpadesign that we decided to do for charity. You guys won’t believe how much the top
bidder donated for this terrarium, and just a hint, it’s about the cost of a car! AC Family, you guys are so generous and make
me proud to have such an amazing caring community! Anyway, watch that video here! Now here’s another thing I haven’t shown
you guys! This is my bog terrarium full of living mosses,
a native tree lichen, vein plants, and Hydrocotyle tripartita plants. This is basically just a plant propagation
tank for my moss, lichen, tripartita, and vein plants. Nothing inside, just plants. I love watching the fogging machine keep the
territories damp. Beside the bog terrarium we have another newcomer,
our massive but docile Chaco golden-knee tarantula. This beautiful tarantula here was a gift exchange
collab with another youtuber friend Exoticslair. She’s been quite busy covering her whole
territory with silk. I can understand why they make such great
beginner tarantula species. She loves being outside in the open and is
pretty friendly. By the way, she too needs a name! Please vote here! Moving on to yet another tarantula, we have
the goddess of the Antiverse, Azula, our Green-bottle Blue tarantula. She’s covered her entire palace now with
a thick blanket of silk where she resides in a back tunnel. When she first came to us sadly, she had a
problem shedding her top carapace giving her a double face look. It eventually fell off, but guys, unfortunately,
it happened again. During her last shed, she failed to shed off
this head piece, but I’m not worried. Like last time, it will likely fall off on
its own. Now moving on to Skull Island, home of our
ghost ants which we acquired for our recent Halloween episode. They come out to feed and boy are there a
lot of them! The ghost ants are trapped on their driftwood
skull island by a moat which contains a snail and shrimp. The tank has been cycling now for many weeks
and is ready to accommodate a water beast. You guys voted for a betta fish to be added
here, so that’s coming up soon! There were also baby tarantulas on the island
which I’m sure are still there somewhere. I just haven’t seen them. Let’s now look at one of the most beloved
ant supercolonies of the channel, the OG Golden Empire, our recovering supercolony of yellow
crazy ants. Now let me be the bearer of the best news
for the year! The Golden Empire is thriving and just exploding
in population now. In case you’re new, they’re actually recovering
from a near fatal infection of blood sucking mites, but I’m happy to announce that there
has been an explosion of eggs, larvae, and pupae. I expect this colony will reach the millions
in numbers they once were in just a few more months. I’ve been thinking though, do you think
we should continue to keep them in an ant farm setup like this so we can still see their
in-nest activities or move them to a terrarium and just watch them above ground? Let me know in this icard here. I like that I can monitor them in their current
setup and they seem to love their formicariums. Speaking of formicariums, we now move on to
my recently returned Asian Bullet Ants. I’ve got two colonies of these, Team 1 which
is doing amazing in their AC Hybrid Nest. As you can see there is a tonne of brood and
a crew of new workers. And check this out! I’ve never seen this species do this before,
but the workers have covered this larvae with soil debris to help give it a lattice work
to spin its silk for the creation of its cocoon. When it’s done, the ants will remove the
soil debris, revealing the finished smooth dark cocoon, like these others here. I had no idea these ants did this! And here you’ll see Team 2, living in their
AC Ant Tower. By the way, about these colonies, I think
I failed to explain in their last video how my plan to keep these ants going would work. The plan was to have these two ant colonies
cross breed so they can continue living on forever, but a lot of you guys brought up
the fact that after a couple generations the colonies would be related and there would
be no more mating. My issue, which I failed to explain properly,
was not so much that the males were unwilling to mate with related females, but that they
were unwilling to mate with females from the same colony, with the same colony scent. That is why I decided a cross-over setup,
where males could cross over to the other side to mate, might actually work at getting
males to mate with females, so long as the colonies stay distinct colonies. Hope that clarifies things better and yes,
a lot of you were correct in saying they would be genetically related after the next generation,
but I think that should be fine, as long as after awhile I add a third colony in the mix
to diversify the genepool. Man, three asian bullet ant colonies? That will be something. Now we move on to the great Hacienda Del Dorado,
which was recently remade into a pineapple beach paludarium. It’s home to our resident trap-jaw ants
named the Jawbreakers and vampire crabs, which hang out in the marsh area. The trap-jaw ants are shy but come out to
feed. I suspect they are mostly nesting here by
the moist marsh. The waters still contain its perpetuating
colony of cherry shrimp, microrasbora fish, and snails. Nearing the end of the Ant Room now, we have
the Triple Island of Avista, the glassless open-concept ant setup of the Bobbleheads,
our super colony of big-headed ants. I love this cute colony! The Bobbleheads are still going strong with
a great appetite, as you can see here where they dine on some chopped up superworm. Check out those supermajors! The plants of the three islands that make
up their archipelago are also growing well! Finally, we come to the Canopy of Vortexia,
the tree top kingdom of my epic, arboreal colony of Asian Weaver Ants we call the Emerald
Empire. These ants of course create their famous hanging
leaf nests which they glue together using silk from their larvae. The Emerald Empire is doing really well, eating
a lot, and they recently built some new leaf nests. The Dubia roaches sharing their territories
are also doing quite well and reproducing on their own, and the weaver ants hunt the
weakest roaches and carry them up to their leaf nests to consume, like they would in
the wild. And guys look! I noticed this week that they’ve begun to
produce male alates. They’re preparing for nuptial flight season! Now you wanna hear something super cool that
I recently discovered? I was surprised to notice an active and thriving
colony of ants living on the forest floor of Vortexia. No, they weren’t pharaoh ants, thank goodness. Now I couldn't figure out where they came
from, but then after looking closer at the ants, I realized, Hey, these ants are familiar! So guys, remember the colony of free-roaming
ants that lived within the hydration chambers of one of my Hybrid Nests? Well, last I reported they had disappeared
one day. I highly suspect that these ants here are
them! Tracing back I believe the free-roam ants,
moved from their Hybrid Nest hydration chamber, down into my old termite tank, and then when
my termites were murdered off by a terrible invasion of pharaoh ants (and yes, in case
you were asking about the termites, I cover the death of our Terminators in a previous
video), I packed up the soil from the termite tank for future use, eventually using it for
Vortexia, and low and behold, they’re Vortexians now. I suppose they eating the scraps left behind
by the weaver ants and dead roaches. It's cool that they are like the bottom feeders
of the territories and don't really bother the weaver ants so much. Amazing right? OK and that concludes the Ant Room, so let’s
move downstairs now… Yup, there’s more! I swear I’m not a hoarder, right? Here of course is my tropical, planted, freshwater
community fish tank. It’s about 5 yrs old now. It contains angelfish, dwarf rainbowfish,
rummynose tetras, Otocinclus catfish, and others. The vegetation is quite lush and I don't really
do much maintenance on plant grooming. I kind of like the chaotic, wild growth look. I often harvest this big mass of java moss
here attached to this driftwood for my terrariums. Now here’s a couple a lot of you guys have
been asking about: my pair of axolotls living in Axolotland. I’m happy to report, they’re bigger, fatter,
and doing great! I have been hoping they would breed but it
hasn't happened yet. I also plan on moving them to a larger tank
very soon. They’ve been such problem-free pets! Last week, of course, we saw Carnivora, my
awesome Carnivorous Plant Tank containing pitcher plants, venus fly traps, and some
moss. But it is now undergoing a hibernation period
until March or April. Beside it is Jabba the Hutt, our cute and
fat Surinam Horned Frog. He’s still a bright green colour and eats
a lot! I love how he will croak randomly when he
hears my voice nearby. I’m also thinking of making him a new terrarium
soon. Here’s the Nucleus, which has proven useful
for the creation of new terrariums. It’s my official composter for leftover
fruit peels and organics and breeding chamber for springtails and other soil creatures. I've since gotten accustomed to seeing the
earthworms but they still repulse me, but what's cool is I've begun to find populations
of some really neat creatures inside, like these small red critters. I'm not sure what they are. Do you guys know? FInally, we have Ligaya, my dragon aka African
Grey Parrot, a pretty awesome bird, super smart, and can copy messenger sounds now. Haha! Check it out! Also, meet Hope my broiler chicken. So get this: she was supposed to be for a
feeding video for the Fire Nation called Fire Ants vs. dead chick, and my request from the
chicken farmer was to give me a dead chick from his batch so I could feed it to my fire
ants, but there must have been a miscommunication because what arrived at my place was a living,
squeaking chick. Of course, I wasn't about to kill it so I
kept it and she’s huge now. These types of meat chickens sadly don't live
long but I've been doing some research to try to prolong its lifespan so it can move
in with me on a farm I'm moving to in a year or so. Let's hope Hope makes it! Here’s Valentino my 5 yr old sorong green
tree python, a stunning snake and super healthy! He is my miracle snake because he came to
me with a severe upper respiratory illness but after medicating him by hand for several
weeks he survived despite the vets saying he had a 10% chance of living. I love him! Finally, here is Crayola, my female veiled
chameleon. She's about a year old soon and I've relocated
her out of my Ant Room and to my balcony where she can get some nice morning sun. She's much happier here now and appreciates
the breeze and height. And that, AC Family is my complete pet and
ant room tour. Some of you guys may have questions about
what happened to some of the other creatures like the rhino beetles. Well, they sadly passed away of old age as
they don't live very long. As for the Lumberjacks, my teleporting carpenter
ants, they were doing ok but sadly must have caught an illness somewhere because they stopped
eating and eventually died. For you fans of the Platinum Dragons, I did
my very best to try to grow them in different setups and offer them various diets but they
remained the same size for months. I finally ended up releasing them this week
because I was clearly missing something from their care. Perhaps the species feeds exclusively on the
nectar of a specific type of flower for instance, or must have honeydew from mealybugs. Not sure, but perhaps I'll try keeping another
species of Polyrhachis again in the future. Unfortunately, die offs and ants that don’t
adapt well to captivity are part of the hobby and though it's sad, it helps us learn how
to better care for the pets we love. If you’ve been with the channel for awhile,
you know that I always commit 100% to go the extra mile to give my pets more than they
need to live out their best lives. I also have a few people in my life, who help
me with maintenance of all these animals. Without my helpful pet team, I definitely
would not be able to keep all these creatures, and I don't recommend any of you guys have
this many pets if you don't have the support for maintenance either. But I think we can all agree that life with
animals, whether tiny or big, is awesome wouldn’t you say?! Do you guys have any pets? Let me know your full pet list in the comments. Now that you guys know all the creatures,
territories, and beasts of my Antiverse, together we are all caught up now and we can start
the channel with a fresh new page! Thank you guys for watching, and be sure to
subscribe to my channel, so you can continue to follow more of the real life stories of
all these inhabitants of our ever-growing Antiverse! It's Ant Love Forever! Alright, AC Family, once again a HAPPY NEW
YEAR 2020 to you all. After creating this full ant and pet tour
I realized I’m pretty much a zookeeper at this point! But it means a lot to me that you guys love
nature as much as I do and continue to watch my weekly videos. So if you haven’t yet, please do subscribe
to the channel, and hit the bell icon for notifications now, and choose ALL, so you
get notified every time I release these high quality nature videos. Also please remember to hit the LIKE button
every single time! AC Inner Colony, I have left a hidden cookie
for you here, if you would like to watch some extended play footage of all the creatures
you saw in today’s episode. And now it’s time for the AC Question of
the Week. Last week, we asked: What type of water do our carnivorous plants
need? Congratulations to The Incarnation of Boredom
who correctly answered: They need distilled or rain water. Congratulations The Incarnation of Boredom,
you just won a free Ultimate Ant Keeping handbook from our shop! In this week’s AC Question of the Week we
ask: Which was your favourite creature featured
in today’s full pet tour? Leave your answer in the comments section
and you could also win a free ebook handbook from our shop! Hope you could subscribe to our channel as
we upload every Saturday at 8AM EST. Please remember to LIKE, COMMENT, SHARE, and
SUBSCRIBE if you enjoyed this video, to help us keep making more. It’s ant love forever!
