A couple weeks ago, I made the announcement
in our 4 Million subscribers episode that I had purchased for us a lush forest, as well
as, an additional 82 acres, i.e. 62 football fields worth of mixed agricultural and remote
landscape. We did this for three reasons: First, these
lands would become our current and future Nature Reserves/Eco-Sanctuaries for wild ants,
as well as the animals that depend on them, to thrive in their native habitats, without
having to worry one bit about pesticides, habitat destruction, or harmful human activities
to threaten their existence. Basically, it would be our conservation project
to help the ants and Mother Nature out a bit! Second, these lands undoubtedly host a tonne
of amazing wild ant colonies for us to discover and film along the way, and hopefully teach
others how important ants are in the ecosystems of the world, and inspire them to love ants
just as much as we do here on the channel. Finally, having our forest and 82 acres of
land, gives us a unique opportunity to help contribute to science as we uncover the ant
secrets the land holds, which surprisingly enough, we already did twice now within our
forest, when we became the first in the world to document new geographic locations of two
ant species. Thereās definitely still so much out there
for us to discover hiding within the wilderness of our lands, and crossing fingers, I still
hope weāre able to discover and name a brand new ant species undiscovered by science. But just this week, guys, an even wilder and
more crazy idea came to me, that I felt might help take these cool conservation projects
of ours, one step further. AC Family, I did some brainstorming, and today
I canāt wait to show you what I have planned: I want to build a Jurassic Park for Ants,
that maybe one day youād be able to visit if all goes well. Promise, no velociraptor ants breaking out
and eating everybody, but guys, I want all of you at home to be involved in the creation
of our new Ant Conservation Park which if plans do push through, would be open to the
public. Welcome to Antopia Park, here on the AntsCanada
Ant Channel. Please SUBSCRIBE to the channel and hit the
BELL icon. Welcome to the AC Family! Enjoy. Now, I just wanna say that Iām not 100%
sold on the idea of an Ant Jurassic Park, just yet, and I even asked you guys what you
thought about the whole idea in a community tab post this week, but today Iāll be talking
about your mixed reactions, as well as what your Great AC Senate thought about this crazy
idea! Iāll also cover all my ideas for our possible
future ant park, all the pros and cons of building such a place, weāll also take a
sample guided tour through our Ant Park and catch up on the ants living in our Forest,
but most important of all, I will be needing all of your help deciding on a few things,
so keep on watching until the end. So letās first start with what you guys
thought about the idea of creating an Ant Conservation Park open to the public. Prior to brainstorming I decided to run the
idea of an Ant Jurassic Park by you guys, posting on my Community Tab: āShould I create
an 82-acre 'Jurassic Park for Ants' open to the PUBLIC/TOURISTS?ā Hereās what you said: Surprisingly, 75%
of you were for the idea, saying youād love to go to a place like that. A quarter of you however, felt it wasnāt
a good idea, in fear of people or tourists littering or destroying the land of our beloved
ants and creatures. Your Great AC Senate, who I also asked, was
even more on the fence! With almost half of the AC Senators voting
against the idea. Thank you to all who voted and gave your valuable
input. I read through all your amazing comments,
heard you out, and took all your valuable feedback into consideration, and so here AC
Family, is what I came up with for a Jurassic Park for Ants that just might work. OK, so weāve got two large ant properties,
each separated by thousands of miles. In fact, the larger property is on an entirely
different island. Letās call Antopia which includes our new
forest Location A, and our 82 acre plot of land Location B. But both properties will
be called Antopia Parkā¦ OK not the most original name nor logo, but
this is tentative for now for the purposes of this video, but feel free to give name
suggestions for our future Ant Conservation Park in the comments, so I can choose my favourites
for us to vote on in a future video, and design an appropriate logo. Alright so picture this: Just like in the
fictional Jurassic Park movie series, we could have two working locations. Antopia, i.e. Location A, could act as our smaller, more
localized Antopia Park, and the 82 acres, i.e. Location B, our bigger, large-scale Conservation
Ant Park. Now my idea is to first launch Phase 1, where
we make Antopia open to visitors first. Then we could see what actually works and
what doesnāt work out, and apply what we learn to our larger Location B. Now a lot of you were concerned that a large
number of tourists would not be good due to littering or destroying of habitat, particularly
for Antopia, which is less than half a hectare of land and forest. I agree with this, so hereās what I propose: We start small with Antopia Park Location
A. I was thinking visitors could be small groups and by reservation only. An AC Senate member even suggested that only
scientific academia be allowed to visit Antopia Park to conduct research. Not sure about that because Iād love for
non-scientists to get a chance to learn about ants, too, but how about if we could control
the volume of visitors coming in, by making Antopia Park visitations a per booking basis? Then weād better be able to control and
monitor the activities of the parkās visitors, perhaps allowing three to five groups of 10
people max per day, and each group have a tour guide accompanying them. What do you guys think of this? Iāll be doing a sample āGuided Tour Through
Antopia Parkā by yours truly in a sec, so hang tight for that. In terms of Antopia Park Location B, I donāt
foresee a tonne of tourists traveling there either, because itās truly in a remote area,
an almost 3 hr car ride from the closest airport. I think only the most hardcore ant-lovers
would be willing to make the trek over to Antopia Park Location B, but if not, I think
we could make visitation there also for reservation-only, and control tourist volume and activity that
way. Now in terms of overnight stay, I have thought
of this, too. Some of you were concerned that building a
hotel or other building on the land was counterproductive, as it would necessarily mean we clear natural
habitat to make way for a man-made building, and I agree, which is why I propose something
else: treehouse villas! So AC Family, get this. Remember how we have many huge trees that
make up the canopy in Antopia? Now imagine three to five treehouse villas,
whose architecture and look is inspired by weaver ant nests, connected of course by stairs
and bridges, and lit by lanterns shaped like weaver ant nests. It might give people a chance to experience
what it feels like being weaver ants living high up in the trees. Would you stay at a weaver ant treehouse villa
at Antopia Park? Another option is to allow for camping, but
perhaps in tents raised off the ground on legs. Of course, our visitors need food and refreshments
so at Antopia Park Location A food would need to be prepared at the Ant House for each group. That way we donāt need to build a restaurant
on Antopia. We could also offer meals from eco-friendly
local restaurants that deliver food in recyclable food containers and such. This option wouldnāt be feasible for Antopia
Park location B, however because there are no restaurants anywhere for miles, so food
would need to come from the local farmers who are farming on some of the land, which
is actually great because it gives them work and provides them and their families a livelihood
and an awesome community purpose. And hereās one final cool idea before we
embark on our sample guided tour of Antopia Park. Tell me if youād try eating this! One thing we could offer on the menu are āentomophagy
optionsā, basically food made from insects. Did you know we humans can now make breads,
pastas, burgers, hotdogs, chips, snacks, and candies from insects? We could offer deep fried cricket salad, mealworm
burgers, and even pizza made with insect dough topped with weaver ant pupae. Now you may think eating insects and ants
seems counterintuitive seeing as Antopia Park promotes saving them, but entomophagy, or
the eating of insects for food, is actually a better and more sustainable source of protein
for humans than the mass produced, hormone and antibiotic-filled meats from livestock. In fact, the mass meat industry is quite destructive
to the environment, due to the unnatural surplus of animal waste produced by the livestock
which enters the ecosystem, as well as the space needed to farm and process these animals. You simply donāt experience these problems
with farming insects, plus insects are a healthier protein source nutritionally than red meats. Anyway, all of these ideas seem crazy, Iām
sure, but what excites me the most about the whole idea of Antopia Park is the prospect
of giving you guys actual guided tours live and in person! Doing this would pretty much be like what
Iām doing already through these videos but in real life, and my script would pretty much
be different every time, depending on what we actually get to see. So, AC Family, come with me now on a hypothetical
tour through Antopia Park Location A, and let me know if this is something youād make
the effort to travel for. Ahemā¦ Good day, fellow ant lovers! Welcome to Antopia Park. Iām your tour guide AntsCanada, and today
weāre going to trek through our ant forest to do some wild ant spotting. Iād like to remind everyone that littering
and smoking are absolutely not allowed anywhere on the park grounds, and we suggest you keep
your fingers to yourselves throughout this tour, as there are a tonne of plants, animals,
and fungi that can kill you. Please feel free to raise your hand if you
have any questions at any point during this tour, and remember to be extra careful not
to step on the ants. Alright? Now letās go! Now if you look along the ground and into
the leaf litter here youāll spot a trail of Asian marauder ants, known scientifically
as Carebara diversa. These ants are found throughout Antopia, and
what makes them special are their huge supermajors which specialize in cutting things open and
defense. You may even spot some of the smaller minors
riding them to save energy. Could you imagine being one of these supermajors
having your sisters piggyback riding you all day?! That would be a major dragā¦ hehe. Now if you listen closely up in the treetops
youāll hear the resounding screeching chorus of some very loud insects. Those are cicadas, males singing to attract
females. The lifecycle of these cicadas are actually
quite amazing. They start off hatching underground from their
eggs as nymphs, and the species you hear now spend 17 long years developing underground
feeding from tree-sap from roots, and then after their 17 yrs of development, they emerge
from the ground and perform their final molt leaving behind their shed skin, which are
the empty casings of exoskeletons you see here. The adults that emerge from these skins are
beautiful and fully-winged, and fly up to the tree tops to mate and give birth to the
next generation of cicadas which will take another 17 yrs to mature. Oh, look here! The final molt is a critical one because itās
above ground where the cicada is completely vulnerable to predators, and as you can see
here, a mob of weaver ants have managed to catch this molting cicada at just the right
time. Poor cicada. I donāt know why they wonāt just weaver
alone! Haha! Speaking of weaver ants, known scientifically
as Oecophylla smaragdina, youāll find trails of them all over the forest here at Antopia
Park, as theyāre one of the top predators as far as ants go, and eat a variety of different
insects. Their hanging leaf nests which they create
using their larvaeās silk to bind the leaves together, were the inspiration to your treehouse
villas that youāll be staying in tonight, and speaking of which the shampoos and soaps
available in your bathrooms are eco-friendly, sulfate-free, and organic. In fact, all of Antopia Park is a 100% zero-waste
eco-friendly establishment, run via solar energy, and only eco-friendly products used,
including the vinegar and baking soda used to clean your toilets and bathtubs, and eco-friendly
detergents to clean your bedsheets. Here frequenting the tree tops are Acrobat
ants, belonging to the genus Crematogaster. These amazing native ants, named after their
ability to walk with their gasters flexed over their heads, are found throughout Antopia
Parkās Forest Ravine. Weāre actually waiting for an exact species
ID on these girls, and weāre all crossing our fingers, because thereās a chance they
may possibly be a new, undiscovered species. In fact, towards the entrance of the park
in the open field, if you looked to the ground, you may have noticed an ant species that is
very abundant here in Antopia Park, that we recently discovered a few weeks ago and was
a bit of a scientific breakthrough of sorts. They are Meranoplus bicolor, a beautiful ant
which we at Antopia Park first discovered to be native to the country. Formerly, scientists hadnāt known they existed
in this country. They are now forever known here as Ant 555,
as theyāre the 555th ant to be added to the countryās species list. Wandering into this dried up seasonal creek,
if you glance up here in this tree, youāll see yet another scientific discovery we made. Dilobocondyla carinata is their scientific
name, and just last week, we were the first to record the species on this island. So as you can see Antopia Park hosts many
hidden myrmecological secrets left for all of us to discover. Yes, you have a question Sir? Iām having trouble seeing your name tag,
ah Mr. Malcolm! Whatās your question? Yes, hi. Iām just curious. How are you funding Antopia Park? Is this government funded or sustained through
donations? Great, question, Sir. Antopia Park is private property of the AntsCanada
Ant Channel, and run by its board of directors the AC Family, as well as its stakeholders,
known as the AC Senate. We also have a great team of volunteers who
are mostly students, that likely hate bugs but just need to rack up the volunteer hours
to graduateā¦ just kidding! I do hear Antopia Park may open up an āAdopt-a-Forestā
program in the future, but what do I know? Iām just a tour guide here, man! Alright, and that concludes our tour of Antopia
Park. Hope you guys enjoyed it, and feel free to
stop by our gift shop at antscanada.com and pick up any of our ant keeping kits, ant farms,
or merch, which will go towards further developing Antopia Park as well as its operation costs. So AC Family what do you guys think? Do you think this Antopia Park idea is feasible? Perhaps the dream is ambitious, but Iāve
learned in life, you gotta dream big! If thereās one thing we can learn from the
ants we love on this channel, itās that with hard work and a million baby steps, grain
by grain, eventually it all adds up, and gradually produces a mountain ant hill. Wouldnāt you say? I once read a biography of a random 18 yr
old kid who scored his first job in Kansas City over a hundred years ago, as a cartoonist. That kid would later go on to build the multinational
mass media and entertainment conglomerate known today as the Walt Disney Company. All great things start off small. You know, when I first started this channel
almost 12 yrs ago, keeping ants in homemade ant farms, in my little bedroom at my parents
house in Canada, I always felt ants were the most amazing creatures on the planet, that
probably had a bad rap. They just needed to be shown in a different
light, in their true beauty, in their brilliant magnificence, and in the right context. I never imagined 12 yrs later, weād ever
be doing large-scale projects like this to help the ants on a more global-scale, but
yet here we are. I donāt intend on stopping and will keep
seeing how far we can go and push the boundaries of ant love. And as far as Iām concerned, you guys are
all Ant Love Ambassadors, who have continued to blow me away again and again over the years. From just browsing the comments, to seeing
the sheer number of you who watch these videos every week, to seeing your amazing participation
in helping me make decisions for the ants, and watching our AC Family grow, itās easy
to see just how much ant love exists in you guys, and how much the ants featured in these
videos have impacted a lot of you in some way or another, and itās truly an inspiring
and humbling thing for a nerdy ant lover like me to witness. If these videos could cause just one person
who sees an ant crawling by to not squish it for no reason, that to me, means the channel
has done its job successfully. If this is you, thank you for giving ants
a chance and for allowing them into your hearts. I do feel Antopia Park, or whatever you think
we should call it, could do some really great things for both the ants of the world, as
well as ourselves one day, if it ever does become a reality. And until the magical day comes, when I am
privileged enough to give you a personal tour through Antopia Park, thank you all for watching
and supporting the ants. Itās ant love forever. I received a notification on my mobile. It was a message from Dr. General regarding
the Crematogaster ants we sent him from our forest in Antopia. I wondered if he had exciting news to share
with us. Did it turn out to be a new undiscovered ant
species? Well AC Family, you guys wonāt believe the
awesome news he had for us regarding the little black Crematogaster ants collected from our
Antopian forest. AC Family, did you enjoy todayās episode? Would you visit Antopia Park? Can you guess what awesome news Dr. General
had to share with us regarding the Creamatogaster ants from Antopia? I will reveal the answer in next weekās
episode. So much nature and ant fun is ahead, so if
you havenāt yet, what are you waiting for? Come be a part of the exciting ant fun and
discovery, and SMASH that SUBSCRIBE button and BELL ICON now, and hit ALL, so you get
notified at every upload. Also donāt 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 watch extended play scenes of the ants we saw during our
Antopia Park tour. And guys, 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 itās time for the AC Question of
the Week. Last week, we asked: Name one layer of a healthy forest. Congratulations to Discoturkey Gamez who answered: The canopy or overstory. Congratulations Discoturkey, you just won
a free Ultimate Ant Keeping Handbook from our shop! In this weekās AC Question of the Week we
ask: What is your favourite part of the Antopia
Park idea? Leave your answer in the comments section
and you could also win a free Ultimate Ant Keeping Handbook 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. Itās ant love forever!
Used to love watching this channel but grew so tired of the production style, each video has about 3 minutes of content put into 20 minutes of bullshit 'YOU'LL NEVER GUESS WHAT HAPPENED NEXT' and flashbacks. Way too exhausting to watch, which is a shame because I love the idea of the channel.
The second he got rid of colony's because he apparently could not feed them I lost faith , he apparently couldn't do that due to lockdown but has shown his thriving feeder colony's and this is a man with the money to buy land and a house ? I think it was more they didn't bring in the views like the fire ants do and it was more work for him and his helpers
Ha a cretin