In the animal kingdom, death paves the way for life, and survival depends on your ability
to defeat and outcompete your opponents.
In our last episode, we were shocked to discover our beloved Jawbreakers, our cherished colony
of trap-jaw ants who we watched grow, were massacred by a savage colony of black crazy
ants, which raided the Jawbreaker's home killing the workers, brood, and queen in cold-blood.
It was truly a tragic ending for the Jawbreakers, but now the question lies.
Who is to inherit this new terrarium which you, the AC Family voted by landslide was
meant to be for the Jawbreakers?
Find out who gets to live in this epic new ant territory which we will build together
in this episode, to be new pastures for one of our four remaining ant colonies.
Also, in our last episode, we launched a worldwide search for official flags for our ant colonies,
and today for the first time you will all be casting your votes to choose an official
flag for our first colony, selected works by you talented members of the AC Family.
All this exciting stuff and more ahead, so keep on watching until the end, so let's all
gather round and issue a triumphant welcome to one lucky ant colony on this channel into
this new unclaimed terrarium, on this episode of the AntsCanada Ant Channel.
Please SUBSCRIBE to my channel, and hit the bell icon, welcome to the AC Family.
Enjoy!
So AC Family, before you sits an empty terrarium, with nothing but earth, some driftwood, and
some earthworms which were transplanted a couple of weeks ago to prepare these soils
for the life which was to thrive within it.
An empty canvas for we the creators, this terrarium was now ready to sustain its own
community.
To provide this new land with energy and light, we have a single bank of flourescent full-spectrum
lighting, as well as two LED spotlamps to provide bright sunning spots for our plants
and terrarium inhabitants.
And below the terrarium we have our new botanical additions.
Because the tank is not as large as the Hacienda Del Dorado, our options for plants are slightly
limited, but it doesn't mean our new terrarium need be boring.
Let's have a look at these plants.
First, we have some gorgeous air plants.
These beautiful plants which belong to the Bromeliad family, are called tillandias and
are classified as airplants because they acquire all their needed water from humidity in the
air.
You might notice the surface of the leaves look fuzzy.
This fuzz is where they get their magic.
The hair-like structures called trichomes on their leaf surface help absorb water from
the air, as well as water that drops onto the surface of the leaves.
These plants are epiphytic which means they attach themselves to other plants and trees.
They make great additions to a terrarium because they can be stuck into nooks and holes in
wood and look absolutely beautiful!
These ones happen to be flowering at the moment, which will add a nice hint of colour to the
terrarium.
Next, we have sphagnum moss.
For years I've used this stuff to decorate terrariums and I love it.
They add a nice touch to any terrarium.
They're highly absorbent and give a nice forest or bog-like finish.
This sphagnum moss is dead, but just a note, if you're going to add this stuff to a terrarium
make sure you buy the non-dyed kind.
If it has a deep green colour and it's dried, then it's likely dyed!
If you're up for a challenge and have ample lighting, you can even try to transplant living
moss from the wild.
Finally, we have my favourite plant for terrariums.
Ficus.
I love ficus because the leaves remain small, but it creates dense foliage with ample lighting,
it is easy to grow, doesn't need extreme amounts of sunlight, and is also a low-laying plant,
which means if you don't have a giant tank, it's perfect as it creates a carpet of intricate
low laying vines along the ground and decor, much like it has in the Hacienda Del Dorado.
So let's do this AC Family.
I have also added some coconut husk to the soil medium to give the soil some structure
and integrity which will help when ants build their tunnels and caverns.
It minimizes cave-ins in case the soil gets dry.
I have made sure to mix up the medium in such a way that it was non-homogeneous, meaning
some areas had the coconut husk and other areas didn't.
This will give the ants more of a choice for ideal soil conditions when nesting.
And so the time has come.
Let's add some life to these desolate lands.
In an hour and a half, our new territory was complete.
Behold our brand new, fully formiscaped terrarium, designed to provide a tropical forest floor
paradise.
Let's have a look shall we?
I've secured our Tillandsias into fitting holes in the driftwood.
They make great feature plants and their soft pink blossoms look quite nice against the
blue wall backdrop of the ant room.
Let's look at the ficus.
You'll notice, I've placed the ficus towards the back.
This will be helpful as the ficus grows, as it will grow towards the spotlamps and carpet
forward, much like it has in the Hacienda Del Dorado.
I will have to keep up with cutting the vines back if the plant gets out of control.
I'm excited to watch how the ficus develops in this terrarium.
And finally, we have our sphagnum moss which I have packed mostly towards the front to
give the terrarium some mossy spots.
This will also help when I water the terrarium because the shagnum helps reduce splash which
when dried on glass can look unsightly, so placing the carpet of sphagnum moss towards
the front will help at keeping the glass front of the tank free of mineral deposits from
water droplets.
And so AC Family, this new terrarium is now ready to provide a lush home for one of our
ant colonies.
And here's where I had a bit of a complication.
A couple videos back, I asked you guys to vote for which colony you thought should live
in this new terrarium, and by a landslide vote, you guys wanted the Jawbreakers to move
in, however they were killed.
So normally, I would by default choose the 2nd place winner which was the Golden Empire.
I was OK with this choice because they were starting to completely overcrowd their current
terrarium, the Hacienda Del Dorado, and in a recent video, we discovered evidence that
the Golden Empire may be producing queens and breeding within their own.
This means then that a population explosion may possibly be in the horizon for the Golden
Empire.
But because the Jawbreakers won by such a landslide, I wanted to be sure you guys wanted
the Golden Empire to move in.
I ran a poll on our Twitter and in 24 hours, the results surprised me.
By a 51% margin, the majority of you chose the Titans to be the ones to inherit this
new terrarium.
One thing that scared me about this choice was that the huge super majors were capable
of chewing through some really hard substances including grout.
If the Titans were to move into this new terrarium, I had to be vigilent to make sure every day
that the baby powder barrier was effective and working.
I didn't want them chewing through the mesh and escaping into my home.
So which colony was I to choose?
The Golden Empire or the Titans?
I decided to sleep on the decision and decide the next day.
The next day came in a flash.
It was time to add the ant colony that deserved this new terrarium the most.
I began to add a thick layer of baby powder along the top of the terrarium which would
keep the ants from reaching the top, making it easier to keep the ants in especially when
working around the tank.
These new territories were now ready to welcome its new ant inhabitants.
Who did I ultimately choose to add to this terrarium?
Was it the Golden Empire?
Or was it the Titans?
Who do you think deserves this terrarium more?
AC Family, I chose to give this new home to, none other than...
The ants within this humble tower, which I laid sideways to encourage the colony to walk
out into their new expanse of a home.
The Titans were at first a bit shocked to find their nest had been opened up and toppled.
The queen and her cohort of supermajors immediately began to mobilize and transport her out of
the now openly lit and exposed chamber.
Right off the bat, it seemed like the ants were a bit dazed and seemed like they didn't
know what to do?
The supermajors kind of romped around, seemingly unconcered that their home had just been put
on its side.
Some workers began to attempt to repair the nest by moving soil around.
It wasn't until several minutes later that the first worker decided to wander into the
new lands.
It eventually returned to the colony and I expected it to bring happy news that a great
new territory laid just beyond the nest and that everyone needed to check it out, but
surprisingly, not many ants came out to explore.
In fact, the ants were not interested in leaving their current home at all.
I decided to place a light directly onto the container to further encourage the ants to
move out.
As for the other two towers, I removed the top and placed one of them here, laying its
long tube close to the first tower so they could easily find each other, and I placed
the third tower between the two towers and also laid it on its side to encourage the
ants to move out into their new territory.
For several hours I watched as the Titans continued to be apprehensive at leaving their
current nest home.
Most ants seemed preoccupied with fixing their home and moving brood to new areas.
Some workers wandered out into the terrarium but not many.
Perhaps the colony just needed some time to warm up to this new home, after all, these
three towers were all they knew for months.
Perhaps we should just give them some time.
I decided to leave the towers like this for the time being and check up on their progress
by night.
Night came, and to my surprise it seemed like not much had changed.
Workers were still busy trying to fix their home.
No workers were exiting from the 1st and 2nd towers.
But then I noticed a little bit of movement from the middle 3rd tower.
There was a bit of a commotion happening.
Hmmm... peeking between the two toppled towers I saw workers that had wandered beyond the
towers and were clearly excited about something on their new land.
This brought me so much happiness.
The Titans had realized that before them was a great unchartered territory.
The Titans had discovered that this new land was now theirs.
It seemed like the colony was slowly sending out workers and workers from the outside rushed
to return to the colony in the 3rd tower with news of their new home.
This was great, because even if the ants within the other two towers seemed nonresponsive,
all we needed was just a few ants to perpetuate the growing idea of moving out, and this eventually
would get the ball rolling and inevitably convince the entire colony to move out.
Perhaps it was a good idea that the queen and her cohort remained in their tower while
this initial party of ants got going with nest construction first before their royal
queen moved in.
Although initially, a part of me had thought the Golden Empire may have been the better
choice for this new territory, watching the ants dancing about on the soils of their new
home now, and watching their excited and erratic movements as they explored their new home
convinced me that we had made the right choice.
Thank you, AC Family for choosing the Titans.
Give yourselves a pat on the back.
We've done well today and just made this very promising ant colony quite happy.
I am not sure when this colony will finally move out, but I think it may be a good idea
to wait for the colony to be ready to move out on their own time.
So what do you say?
What should we call this new ant territory?
Leave your suggestions in the comments section and I will choose my favourites for us to
vote on together in a future video.
And to commemorate the start of this triumphant move into these new pastures, it is now time
AC Family for us to vote on an official flag for the Titans.
Are you guys ready?
Behold, the finalist flags chosen to represent our majestic Titans.
Please take a few moments to look at each flag carefully and vote for your favourite
flag in this icard poll here, AC Council.
The winning flag will become the official symbol of this colony, and its desginer will
win a free Omni Nest Small courtesy of AnstCanada.com.
By the way, if you haven't entered yet, we are still accepting flag entries, so click
the forum link in the description box of this video to post up your flag submission for
a chance to win an Omni Nest from AntsCanada.com.
Alright, AC Family.
Be sure to tune in next week, as we continue to follow how our Titans do at moving into
this new terrarium.
Let's hope the entire colony, queen, cohort, brood and all move into these new lands soon,
so we can watch them grow fruitfully.
And thus ends another episode of the AntsCanada Ant Channel.
Thank you, AC Family for watching.
We will see you again next week.
It's ant love forever.
OK AC Family, are you as excited as I am to see the Titans move into this new terrarium?
I also can't wait to see which flag you guys vote for to represent them.
AC Inner Colony, I have left a hidden cookie for you here to watch some extended play footage
of the Titans.
And now it's time for the AC Question of the Week!
Last week we asked:
What ant colony killed our beloved Jawbreakers?
Congratulations to Gavin Guerrero who correctly answered:
Savage black crazy ants killed the Jawbreakers﻿.
Congratulations to Gavin Guerrero you just won a free AC test tube portal from our shop.
In this week's AC Question of the Week, we ask:
Name one fact mentioned in this video about air plants.
Leave your answer in the comments section and you could win a free ebook handbook from
our shop.
Hope you can subscribe to the channel as we upload every saturday at 8AM EST.
Don't forget to LIKE, COMMENT, SHARE, & SUBSCRIBE if you enjoyed this video so we can keep making
you cool ant videos like this.
It's ant love forever!