Have you ever thought about what it might
be like to keep pet ants? Or maybe you think: Ew why would anyone find
the idea of ant keeping appealing? Well, today, we’ll take a quick break from
our usual ant stories on this channel, to teach you how to start, feed, house, grow,
and care for your pet ant colony, and I promise by the end, you’ll be an ant keeping pro,
and understand why millions of us ant keepers around the world have fallen in love with
keeping ants as pets. Welcome to the AntsCanada Ant Channel… Tutorial Edition! Please SUBSCRIBE to the channel, and hit the
BELL ICON. Welcome to the AC Family. Enjoy! Alright, so whether you’re curious and wanted
to get started in ant keeping, or you’ve been lucky enough to find a queen ant this
nuptial flight season and want to know what your next step is to start your own ant colony,
this ultimate in-depth tutorial will take you through all the basics of ant keeping,
inform you on what to look out for, what you need, and can expect, as well as answer your
most frequently asked questions, to start you out on the right path on your ant keeping
journey. And also guys, keep on watching until the
end for our special AC Ant Farm Kit giveaway from Antscanada.com. Now, let me begin by saying if you look deep
enough on this channel, I have a tonne of helpful tutorials on a number of topics on
ant keeping. It’s actually how this channel started,
so for all you O.G. subscribers to this channel, perhaps this video might feel nostalgic. I will try my best to compile everything you
need to know about ant keeping in this one video, but after watching, feel free to also
check out my full AC Ant Tutorial Playlist here to deep dive into specific topics, or
even better, if you really want to become an ant keeping expert, I highly recommend
you pick up our newly revised Ultimate Ant Keeping Handbook Ebook from our shop at antscanada.com,
which for years has helped hundreds of thousands of aspiring ant keepers get started in the
hobby, and even has info on specific commonly kept ant species. Alright, now let’s get to our first step:
Getting Started in Ant Keeping! One of the most common questions I get from
you guys is “What is a good beginner ant species?” and my answer to that is basically,
whatever species of ant you commonly see outside your home. Growing up in Toronto, Canada it would be
pavement ants from the genus Tetramorium, carpenter ants from the genus Camponotus,
black field ants from the genus Formica, and garden ants from the genus Lasius. Whatever ants you commonly find outside your
home is already adapted to your weather conditions, water quality, food types, etc which will
make your ant keeping experience a lot easier. Plus, if you find them commonly outside, chances
are finding a queen of those species will be easier. We never recommend buying ants online to be
shipped to you from outside your country for a number of reasons, which I outline in another
tutorial here. Plus, one of the advantages of keeping locally
caught ants, is if you can’t keep them anymore for whatever reason, you can always release
them, with no negative impact on your local ecosystem or the ants. OK, so to get started, you basically need
a queen ant, as she is the one to lay all the eggs and will keep your colony growing
for years. Now there are three ways to get one. You can 1) try digging up a colony with a
queen from the wild, which is the hardest option, because the workers will hide the
queen well, and plus you risk injuring the queen, or 2) you can try to catch a newly
mated queen ant and start your colony from there, which personally is the best option,
or 3) you can try visiting our “Queen Ants For Sale section” on our website antscanada.com,
which isn’t a queen ant store, but rather a listing of real ant keepers in your city
or region who are selling ant colonies in your city to people like you looking for an
ant colony with a queen. This is an ecologically and ethical option
for sourcing your queen ant or ant colony with a queen. But let’s assume you would like to start
from scratch, the classic way to start, by catching your queen ant. Here’s how to do it! So, every Spring and Summer virgin reproductive
queens and male ants, called alates, emerge from their nests and fly into the air and
mate. Every species has their period in the year
when they have these mating flights. During these mating flights, queens will mate
with multiple male ants and then fall to the ground, break off their wings, and go off
in search of a place to start their own colonies. The males die, as they’re no longer needed. So sad, but true. But your job, is to try to find these mated
queen ants preferably with wings broken off, though wing shedding isn’t always an accurate
indicator that the queens have mated so if you find a queen ant with wings still, catch
her as she may break her wings off later or even keep them on forever. Many people who might not be familiar with
what a queen ant might look like, might see a large worker ant and mistakenly think it’s
a queen. Basically, a queen ant is larger, has wing
scars on her thorax, has a larger thorax than regular worker ants, and has a larger abdomen. I have tutorials on this channel on how to
spot and distinguish queen ants from regular worker ants, if you’re having a hard time,
so look that up in our tutorial playlist if you need to. Once caught, you need to place the queen into
what is called a test tube setup, which will simulate the Earthen burrow the queen would
have made to begin her egg-laying process. The test tube setup is basically a test tube
with water sectioned off to one side of the test tube with cotton and another cotton ball
plugging the opening of the test tube. This test tube setup will be the home of your
colony for the next few months or even up to over a year, depending on how fast your
colony grows. We’ve got extra spacious test tubes that
don’t roll, specifically made for ant keeping at our shop if you need them, but if it’s
a dire emergency, you can also get water picks from your local florist. Only keep one queen per test tube, because
though there are ant species that do tolerate multiple queens in a colony, setting up the
conditions in a captive setup which allows for multi-queen colonies to happen is difficult,
and chances are your queens will cooperatively raise their colony together for the first
little while, but once the workers arrive, they’ll kill each other. You only need one egg-laying queen to get
started. So once your queen is in this test tube setup,
the key now is to not disturb her as much as possible for the next few weeks. She needs to feel secure, and preferably kept
in the dark. I like to keep my incubating queen ants under
some towels in a closet. It’s the hardest thing to not check up on
her every 10 minutes, believe me, I know, but if you must, I would say checking up on
her every 3-4 days is the maximum for now. Over stressing the queen at this stage could
lead to her eating her brood, which you don’t want. Now a lot of people ask, “How long would
it be before the queen lays eggs?” and “When will my first workers arrive?” The answer to this depends on species and
the temperature at which you keep the queen. If the test tube is kept in a warm room or
garage, the time to egg-laying and adult workers arriving is shorter. If kept in an air conditioned room, the time
is longer. Queen ants can start laying immediately or
may start laying eggs within the week. Now during this period you don’t need to
feed the queen at all as she will be subsisting off muscle stores in her back wing muscles
and also barfing up a self-made nutritious soup for her young, until they are full grown
adult worker ants. It may take anywhere between 2-8 weeks for
ants to go from egg to worker, so you really need to be patient. Keep them quiet, in the dark, and away from
any vibrations. So once you have a queen and a small family
of workers, then what? When do you actually get to feed them? As a rule, I usually wait 7-10 days after
the first worker arrives before offering a colony food. A good indicator of whether or not the starting
colony is ready to have their first meal is if the ants start to show signs of pulling
at the cotton. It means they’re trying to dig out of their
founding chamber to look for the colony’s first meal. So as a first meal, you can try feeding a
tiny drop of sugar water administered by a toothpick, and then later a cricket leg or
crushed insect. I don’t recommend you give them too large
of a food item at this stage as the pioneering workers are a bit delicate and you also risk
a mold outbreak in your test tube. Some freshly killed small insect or insect
body part is the best option at this point after sugar water. So now that we’re on this topic let’s
talk about ANT DIET! Ants need two food types: They need carbs
or sugars like sugar water, fruits, nectar, seeds, or honey, and they need a protein food
source, usually feeder insects like crickets, mealworms, superworms, or feeder roaches. I don’t recommend feeding insects caught
outside as they can contain pesticides which would kill your ants. I once lost a whole colony by feeding a few
flies caught outside. If live feeder insects freak you out, you
can try cooked meats and fish, dog food, or fish flakes, but at some point, ants really
flourish when they have feeder insects to eat. So keep this in mind and experiment with a
broad array of different foods. The colony also needs fresh water at all times,
which in the beginning can be drunk from the cotton holding the water back in their test
tube setup. Never use sugar water in your colony’s test
tube setup as the colony still needs fresh water, plus the ants will inevitably defecate
in your founding test tube setup and if mixed with sugar water this could lead to a disastrous
bacterial or mold outbreak. So you have your colony in a test tube with
many workers, but the water in your test tube is running out or it gets moldy. What do you do then? Well, you can attach a second test tube setup
using tape, allowing air to enter by untaping every day, or you can fixate a fresh test
tube nearby, with a connecting chamber like this ac Test Tube Portal. The ants will simply move the colony, queen,
brood, and all to the fresh test tube setup when they are ready. Just trust the ants will know when it’s
best to move. Don’t force a move as this can injure the
queen and/or brood. You can also start to offer the colony’s
food in this chamber. You’ll see the ants will start treating
the test tube like their nest and the chamber like an outdoor feeding area and garbage site. So once the colony is bigger, say at 50-100
workers strong, or even more if possible (the bigger the better) this is the best time to
finally introduce your colony to their first proper ant farm. I waited until the Phoenix Empire, the fire
ant colony on this channel was a couple hundred workers strong before I finally introduced
them to their first official ant farm. The danger with introducing your colony to
an ant farm or large space too early is they might dry out, might not have enough worker
power to properly thermoregulate or hydroregulate the babies, or get too spaced out in too large
a space which means less efficiency for the colony as a unit. One of the biggest mistakes ant keepers make
is moving their ant colony into an ant farm too early. Now let’s talk about housing! Let’s talk Ant Farms! One of the most fun things is getting your
ant colony all setup in their first ant farm! First off, let me issue a warning that gelfarms
are bad! Ant keepers know how bad gelfarms are for
ant colonies. They eventually break out in mold, don’t
contain proper nourishment for an ant colony, and are just all around bad for ants. If you have your ants in a gelfarm right now
just simply replace the gel with digging medium and allow your ants to dig. There are many types of great ant farms, but
basically they fall into three categories: Digging Ant Farms, like this ac Ant Tower,
where the ants are given the liberty to dig tunnels and create chambers in a digging medium. Non-digging ant farms, like this ac Hybrid
Nest where the tunnels and chambers are made for them, or terrariums where you basically
create a planted habitat and allow the ants to dig in the soil. You can also have hybrids of these three types. If your ant farm doesn’t have a feeding
area, like this ac Hybrid Nest, you will need to connect the ant farm using tubes to a feeding
area, called an outworld where you will place all the ants’ food. The ants will leave their nest to collect
the food from their outworld, and dump all their garbage for you to clean up in their
outworld. Each type of ant housing has its pros and
cons, and it basically is up to the ant keeper which housing he/she prefers, as they each
offer varying degrees of visibility, liberty for the ants’ natural behaviours to be displayed,
and offer different aesthetics. A good ant farm, though is one that allows
for a moisture gradient, meaning an area that is a bit more moist and an area that is a
bit more dry, has at least minimal ventilation, and is escape proof. Speaking of which, now to address how to contain
the ants. Ant keepers use ant barriers to keep their
ants in their setups, particularly in terrariums and outworlds with an open top. You can use a layer of petroleum jelly, baby
powder mixed with rubbing alcohol which dries and becomes super slippery for ants, or this
stuff called PTFE or fluon. I prefer to use baby powder mixed with rubbing
alcohol, which I smother on the bottom of ac Outworld lips or can be painted along the
top of terrariums. And finally, let's talk maintenance: ants
are considered super low maintenance in the beginning when they’re in a test tube, limited
to simply feeding and cleaning garbage up once or twice a week. But once they get into the thousands, duties
start to pick up. Continue to offer the colony as much food
as they will eat without tonnes of it laying around in their ant farm or outworld to keep
mold outbreaks at bay. A few feeder insects a week is good for a
small colony, along with freshwater and sugar water offered in a test tube 24-7. If you keep your colony warmer than room temperature,
they’ll grow much faster. Clean up their garbage once a week by spot
cleaning, water their ant farm periodically if it dries out, and expand your setup as
the colony gets bigger. If you want to slow down your ant colony’s
growth rate and don’t want them to reach into the millions, simply lower the temperature
they’re kept at and limit how much food you give them. I regulate temperature by adjusting the thermostat
of the room they're kept it, or you can use heating cables to heat up sections of their
nest. Don't place the ant farm in direct sunlight
as you will cook the ants. Just a note that if you live in an area that
has winter, the ants will enter a dormant state by late Fall, at which point you can
simply keep them in a cold place of your home. You don’t need to feed them, but you will
need to make sure they have water at all times, and just enjoy the ant keeping break until
Spring when they start to wake up again. I actually love that with ant keeping in a
temperate climate, you can take a yearly break from the ants, which keeps the hobby fresh
year after year. Some say hibernating your ants prolongs the
queen’s life so it’s best to keep your colony
cold in the winter. By the way, your colony could live as long
as 30 yrs depending on the species! If you have black crazy ants like our Dark
Knights, they live and breed healthily forever within an enclosed ant farm! Overall, ants are super rewarding pets, and
I am positive if you give them a try, they’ll surely offer you, many hours of discovery,
wonder, and satisfaction. I hope this tutorial helped answer all of
your questions, but if you still have questions, feel free to watch more ant tutorials on this
channel. Ants have taught me some very valuable lessons
in life, including the importance of patience, responsibility, and persistence. Keeping ants, as you may have seen on this
channel, can shed a lot of amazing insight not only on the world of biology, but also
on our own world, on ourselves. If you snoop around and watch a few more videos
on this channel, you’ll see just how mind-blowing and interesting the secret world of ants really
is, but I won’t spoil it for you: try it for yourselves! Once you get your first ant colony going,
thriving, and operating in your first epic ant farm, you’ll understand why millions
of people have fallen in love with the hobby and these amazing little creatures we call
ants. Thank you for watching and best of luck on
your ant keeping experience! It’s ant love forever! AC Family, did you enjoy today's tutorial
episode? Hope this video inspires more of you to join
me in this amazing educational hobby, and if so and/or if you haven’t yet, do SMASH
that SUBSCRIBE button and BELL ICON now, and hit ALL so you get notified at every upload,
because I think notifications are broken again. Also don’t forget to hit the LIKE button
every single time including now. It would really mean a lot to me, guys. Thank you! AC Inner Colony, I have left a hidden cookie
for you here, if you would like to see some updated footage of the Phoenix Empire, my
current fire ant colony, which is the biggest ant colony I own today. Go check them out! And guys, did you know that it’s anting
season in the Northern Hemisphere, and you don’t even need to leave your home to start
an ant colony?! You can catch pregnant queen ants from the
safety of your own backyard, balcony, or open window starting this month! Be sure to visit AntsCanada.com for all your
ant keeping and collecting gear shipped to you in a special package from our ant-loving
facility in the USA, so you can get the most out of your ant keeping experience. We ship worldwide and also offer full email
support if you need our help! We also have a helpful forum and ant colony
trading marketplace on the site. Visit AntsCanada.com today. And now it’s time for the AC Question of
the Week. Last week, we asked: What makes this future fire ant home so
special among all other terrariums we’ve ever built before on this channel? Congratulations to Lee Ming who answered: The whole AC Family is building
it together poll by-poll. Congratulations Lee Ming, you just won a free
Ultimate Ant Keeping handbook from our shop! In this week’s AC Question of the Week we
ask: What is a nuptial flight? Leave your answer in the comments section
and you could win a free ac Ant Tower Small Deluxe Kit + Ultimate Ant Keeping Handbook
E-book from our shop! Hope you could subscribe to the 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!
