Oh boy!
AC Family, today's episode is a special one!
Ants happen to be one of the worlds top predators and scavengers in the ecosystems they are
part of, and in our Ant Room we have watched ants devour and dismantle a lizard, a turtle,
bird-eater tarantula, roaches, mice, and even my arm!
But today, we have a closer look at why ants are so meat-hungry, and follow the journey
of a fateful cricket that will be fed to our aggressive and ruthless weaver ant colony,
we here on the channel call the Emerald Empire.
You will not be able to look away from this feeding video, and will surely find yourself
thankful that you are not an insect and that ants are not human-sized!
Also, a special treat this week, as we welcome to the channel a special guest to help me
talk about ant diet and insect prey, so keep on watching until the end.
Gather round, nature-lovers as we enter the Canopy of Vortexia, the jungle kingdom of
the Emerald Empire, who awaits anxiously to be fed their cricket meat, here on the AntsCanada
Ant Channel.
Please SUBSCRIBE to the channel, and hit the BELL icon, welcome to the AC Family.
Enjoy!
A female field cricket awaits eagerly in the darkened stillness of her keep for me to make
a return bearing gifts from the heavens.
Male field crickets also pace about, with their ornately venated wings which they usually
use to create their famous chirping sounds for attracting females for mating, but tonight,
romance isn't so much on their minds.
They're also waiting for me to deliver their sacred gifts.
You'll see in a sec what exactly I have for them!
These black field crickets are known scientifically as Gryllus bimaculatus, and are each sacred
creatures in our Ant Room.
I see them as holy vessels of life, set to be distributed to all the kingdoms of our
Antiverse.
Now, the technical name for a group of crickets is an orchestra, fittingly, and this orchestra
is finally about to receive my long-awaited gifts now.
Behold, a piece of apple, broccoli, and carrot.
They've waited for these delectable nuggets all day, so let's give them to the orchestra
shall we?
Placing in the apple... and the broccoli... and the carrot.
As soon as the crickets' long antennae touch the morsels, they instantly begin to feast.
Look at them go!
Crickets happen to be eating machines, and believe it or not, these tasty morsels will
be done in just a few hours.
Feast, my beloved vessels of life, for you shall soon fulfill your destiny bringing life
to all corners of the Antiverse.
The apple slice, broccoli piece, and carrot coin each contain a variety of valuable nutrients,
which will be filling the crickets' guts.
In fact, what I'm doing here is called 'gut-loading'.
In a weird sadistic way, I love watching my crickets chowing down on the food items I
give them, because I know, all the food they eat now, will end up in the bellies of the
creatures that will be eating them soon.
In case, you haven't figured out by now, these crickets will be sacrificed as prey items
for my various pet ant colonies and beasts, and, as a rule, your pets are what their food
eats, so before feeding the crickets, I make sure they are fattened and jam-packed with
nutritious goodness.
Aside from being super easy to keep and breed, one of the reasons crickets make super ideal
food items for insectivorous pets, is because they eat so voraciously and accept a variety
of food items.
Look at these crickets just pigging out!
In just a few moments, one of these sacred vessels of life will be chosen to provide
nourishment to one of our most beloved ant kingdoms of the Antiverse, the Emerald Empire.
The canopy of Vortexia, home to my pet Weaver Ant Colony, called the Emerald Empire.
AC Family, they're hungry for some flesh tonight, and they wait every three days for this meat-feeding.
Tonight, they're going to feast on a fattened cricket for the very first time.
I'm actually also eager to watch how they'll deal with a new prey item they've never before
had.
They usually eat mealworms, but something tells me, they'll love the taste of dark cricket
meat!
The Emerald Empire here are a special species of ant that specialize in living in trees
and shrubs.
They construct grand basket nests using plant leaves that are glued together via silk produced
by their larvae.
Last week, we saw them constructing these two new leaf nests, and because the larvae
had to produce so much silk in order to make these leaf nests, the larvae and the colony
as a whole, are actually starving for some protein!
And so AC Family, let's give them their fattened calf now!
This here is the feeding pad onto which I always place their food.
As standard practice, I pre-crush prey insects before feeding them to the ants, which is
what I did to this cricket.
The ants wait eager below for me to lower tonight's interesting meal.
Let's do this, AC Family!
1 - 2 - 3!
As soon as the cricket hits the floor the ants quickly mobilize, and what I love about
weaver ants is their seizing technique.
Weaver ants seize their prey by grabbing them by their appendages and stretching them out
so they cannot get away.
It isn't long before the ants release the "We Got Food, Sisters!" pheromone, which draws
more ants to the scene to help out.
Typically, if this cricket were alive, there would be more of a fight, and the ants would
be spraying formic acid to help kill the cricket, but I personally don't believe in live feeding
if it isn't necessary, and the ants don't benefit in any way from having to go into
battle with their prey.
In many cases, some ants can get hurt, and there have been many cases in the past where
the prey actually gets away and starts to proliferate in the tank which can be annoying.
So as soon as the ants feel the cricket is absolutely dead and will not put up a fight,
they then begin to coordinate an orchestrated, cooperative transport of the carcass home
to one of their leaf nests.
Now this, AC Family, is where the amazing process begins!
Now you must remember that to these weaver ants, this huge cricket would be like us having
to transport a horse.
And on top of that, imagine having to do that way up high in a tree the size of a sky scraper!
Not an easy task, but something these ants specialize in!
They pull and they tug, hauling the cricket over the edge of the platform.
This process of carrying the prey home is super vital for the colony because at any
time, a bird or other animal could come along and steal this cricket from them, so there
are always ants that drone around acting as security, ready to bite any foreign creature
coming close.
The Emerald Empire feels most comfortable hunting at night in the cover of darkness,
when many of their predators, competitors, and enemies are asleep, but there is still
a danger of nocturnal thieves lurking about, so they don't take this food transport operation
lightly.
They need to bring home the cricket bacon ASAP!
Now AC Family, while we watch the Emerald Empire maneuvering this cricket carcass home,
as mentioned earlier in the video, we are lucky to have a special guest to share some
interesting info on ant diets and feeding.
AC Family, I'm pleased to welcome to the channel, my good friend Danielle from the Youtube channel,
Animalogic!
Danielle, take it away!
Hi Mikey, Weaver ants are one of my favourite ants not only because of their amazing colonies,
but also because of the way they use them to feed themselves.
These guys are famously territorial and will attack and eat anything that gets in their
personal space.
They’re known to take down animals as large as small birds and rodents.
So, this cricket didn’t stand a chance.
But the cool thing is that even though they kill relatively large animals to get protein
and minerals, their favourite foods are vegetarian.
In the wild, a large portion of their calories come from natural sugars like nectar and tree
sap.
In an amazing feat for an ant colony, they have also developed a form of agriculture.
They take in scale insects such as mealybugs and bring them into their colonies, protecting
them from predators.
Then they “milk” these tiny insects for a sugary secretion called honeydew, which
is incredibly delicious and nutritious to ants.
But don’t worry, this is not the same kind of honeydew that ice cream is made of, though
now that I think about it, it would probably be delicious.
Thanks for welcoming me into the Ants Canada family!
When you’re done watching Mikey’s video, head on over to my channel, Animalogic, and
watch our episode, which is a deep dive into weaver ant biology.
Please like, subscribe and hit that bell!
Thank you so much, Danielle!
That was awesome!
In just a few minutes, the cricket is so close to the leaf nest now.
Can you believe their strength and coordination?
I could sit and watch these ants do this for hours!
The ants choose one of the various openings into their nest, and carefully move the cricket
in.
Once inside, the weaver ants will park the carcass in an ideal chamber within the nest
and begin to feed on the soft innards of the cricket.
With it, the ants will be consuming the special gifts we gave the crickets at the start of
this video, which fills the crickets' guts.
All of this valuable nourishment and protein will go towards nourishing the growing larvae,
which will produce more silk for future nest building and grow to become adult weaver ants.
And this, AC Family, is how life continues on as it passes from one creature to the next.
When I first started feeding insects to pets, as a kid, sure it was sad and disturbing at
first, but I remember being more fascinated with the entire process of predation.
It was amazing to me how death gives way to new life, how one living cricket can bring
nourishment and life to thousands of living individuals consuming it.
Being able to witness and observe predation has always been one of the most interesting
aspects of keeping ants, and AC Family, I'm grateful to have watched the process today
with you.
You know, it also makes me more conscious about the meats and even plants, I eat day
in and day out.
Have you ever wondered what your food eats?
What your chicken, your pork, your beef or fish feed on?
Ever wonder what your veggies and fruits grow in, what regions of the world they come from?
In this age of growing awareness in the realm of food, I'm often reminded of these relevant
questions.
To the point in fact, that I've gone so far as purchasing my own farm, on which I intend
to grow my own vegetables, fruits, and raise my own meats and fish.
If you're interested, do check out my vlog on my daily vlogging channel for my plans
on that, by clicking on this icard here.
As I said earlier, we are what we eat, and I figure, if we could at least know where
our food comes from and intrinsically manage the journey of our food from its origin to
our bellies, perhaps it can mean a healthier existence, and even a holistic one, where
we consciously understand our place in the global food web, and like the Emerald Empire
become masters of our piece of the biological orchestra.
AC Family, did you enjoy today's episode?
Special thanks to Danielle from Animalogic for guesting in today's video and sharing
some valuable ant knowledge.
Be sure to check out the Animalogic channel here on youtube, as it's one of my favourites.
They've got a lot of great and informational videos, on so many animals.
Providing amazing facts that will blow your mind.
Their episode this week is also an interesting deep dive into the biology of weaver ants,
and I share a few tidbits of info there, too so go check it out after this video!
If you enjoyed this week's enlightening ant episode, it's not over!
We upload a mind-blowing ant and/or animal video every single week, so smash that SUBSCRIBE
button and BELL ICON for notifications now, to join our growing AC Family, so you don't
miss out on next week's episode.
And don't forget to hit the LIKE button every single time, including now!
It would really help a lot!
If you're new to the channel, and want to catch up on all your AntsCanada Lore, feel
free to binge watch this complete story line playlist here, which traces the origins of
all the ant colonies of the ant room, so you can follow their stories and better appreciate
how these ant kingdoms came to be, and why we love them so much!
AC Inner Colony, I have left a hidden cookie for you here, if you'd like to see extended
play footage of the weaver ants carrying the cricket into their leaf nest.
Do go and check out that hidden video!
And now it's time for the AC Question of the Week!
Last week we asked:
What evidence did we see in today's video that proves there indeed is a living
queen in the Emerald Empire?
Congratulations to Karen Wilkins who correctly answered:
There are larvae and eggs in the colony, and without
the queen, there wouldn't be any larvae or eggs.
Congratulations, Karen, you just won a free e-book handbook from our shop!
In this week's AC Question of the Week, we ask:
What is gut-loading?
Leave your answer in the comments section and you could also win a free e-book handbook
from our shop!
Hope you can 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!