Welcome everyone to the AntsCanada Ant Channel.
Behold this terrarium, initially designed to become the bountiful home of one of our
ant colonies.
Over the past couple of months though, we have found it to breathe with of a sort of
mysterious life energy.
Creatures live within it, feed, and proliferate in these lands, but it seems, the most odd
occurrences keep happening every time we attempt to introduce an ant colony into these lands.
And here slithers the terrarium's latest oddity: a tiny snake, which we found one night wandering
around the moss.
It had likely been intoduced to the tank via a trojan horse by way of the ficus which was
planted during the creation of these territories.
Though it may be mistaken for a worm, make no mistake, this is indeed a serpent and also
an ant baby-eater!
As soon as we identified this snake as a threat to our Titans, a young Asian Marauder Ant
colony that is in the process of rehabilitating in these territories, we went on a snake hunt
to try to get rid of this lethal beast, but almost as if the terrarium had a mind of its
own, in our previous video Ants vs Snake, as I tore the terrarium apart to find the
snake, it managed slip away without me noticing.
In fact, you guys at home watching pointed out the snake to me in the video, and I hadn't
even noticed even during editing that the snake had eluded me undetected.
Which then brings us to last week's video.
Out of nowhere I spotted the serpent again, and this time, I was determined to catch it,
and today nothing was going to stand in my way of finally capturing our ant killer.
Welcome everyone to this week's episode of the AntsCanada Ant Channel.
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Welcome to the AC Family.
Enjoy!
I acted quickly, and as soon as the snake felt the vibrations of my approach, like a
rock it amazingly plunged deep into a worm hole.
I instantly went to ground to chase it.
I dug up the earth, and scoured all the soil I upturned.
I saw a lot of creatures in the soil, including earthworms, but couldn't find the snake.
It was too fast!
I thought I had lost it for sure.
But then, about 5 minutes later, out of nowhere...
Success.
Behold, our ant-feeding beast.
I couldn't believe we actually captured it.
Wow!
Look at it move!
Time to study this creature, AC Family.
Let's have a closer look.
This is Indotyphlops braminus, commonly known as the brahminy blind snake.
These nonvenomous snakes are completely fossorial animals, meaning they are obligate burrowers,
living most of their life underground.
They are known as blind snakes because of the fact that they have poor vision, and are
known to only distinguish light and dark and perhaps some shapes.
Other common names include common blind snake, island blind snake, Hawaiian blind snake,
and flower pot snake, a name they got due to the fact that this species of snake has
been incidentally introduced to various parts of the world through the plant trade, hitching
rides in soils of plant pots, which is how it ended up in our terrarium.
When I had first seen it crawling around, I initially didn't know what to make of it,
as it didn't seem to possess a pronounced head.
In fact, at first, I had thought it was some kind of long millipede, but what finally screamed
snake to me was its tiny tongue which frequently flicked out to smell the world as it slithered
about.
Upon further research, I found out that these guys happen to be native to the Philippines
where I live, and are, to my surprise, also quite common here.
They frequently appear above ground during rainy season when they are forced out of their
burrows due to flooding.
They also are native to other parts of Asia and Africa.
They are known to occur in both urban and agricultural areas, and often live inside
ant and termite nests.
They are also found under logs, moist leaves, humus in wet forests, dry jungles, and even
city gardens, which means our terrarium here was a perfect home for it, and with the Titans,
our Asian Marauder ants living here, the snake had a good supply of food to rely on.
The amazing thing about this snake species is it is parthenogenic, meaning they can breed
without the presence of a partner.
In fact, all specimens collected so far have been female.
They lay eggs or may bear live young.
Up to eight offspring are produced - all female and all genetically identical to mom.
Yes, these snakes literally clone themselves!
I had hoped this snake hadn't had the opportunity to lay its eggs or bear young in the terrarium.
Only time would tell, but for now, we had the serpent in our possession.
I added some soil so it could burrow and feel comfortable while we decided what exactly
we were going to do with the snake.
In the Ants vs Snake video I asked you, the AC Family, what we should do with the snake.
Should we release it into the wild, and some of you expressed concern over the fact that
the snake wasn't native so release would have been destructive, but now you know they are
and it would have been safe to release.
Another option I presented was if we should use it to control the population of some of
our other super colonies which were growing profusely unchecked.
Finally, I also proposed that we unleash the snake in the area where the wild black crazy
ant colony which killed our Jawbreakers were living.
Surprisingly, by a landslide, the AC Family chose retribution, vengeance for the blood
of the Jawbreakers.
You guys demanded for the snake to feed on the babies of the savage black crazy ant colony.
So your wish was my command.
I carefully dumped the contents of the container onto a large surface so I could isolate the
snake to properly transplant it into one of the pots on my balcony where I knew the black
crazy ants had set up one of their satellite nests.
I worked carefully, and was prepared for the very agile snake to jump out of the rubble
at any moment.
Where was it?
But AC Family, what I found shocked me, for in the dirt laid the lifeless body of our
Brahminy snake.
It had died in the container overnight.
Oh man.
I'm not sure why it died.
The container was properly ventilated, out of the sun, and had relatively the same moisture
level as that within the terrarium.
Perhaps, the snake had gone a long time without food?
Perhaps it had died of natural causes, old age?
I didn't know, but in a strange way, I felt really sad discovering it had died.
Ironic to think that I once saw it as a beast and direct threat to our Titans, but in this
moment, I was feeling a bit of remorse and guilt somehow.
With the snake now dead, I thought for a moment what I should do with the snake.
Should I throw it in the trash?
I held it in my hand for a bit.
Then I looked towards the terrarium, and there was what felt like the right choice.
I decided to bury it in the terrarium from which it came and lived for its last couple
months of its life.
It seems whatever this terrarium provided the snake, was keeping it alive all this time,
and once it was removed from the terrarium, it died.
Right before buring it, I suddenly noticed something.
I could finally see its face.
Little eyes and a sort of smiling mouth.
Prior to this moment, I had not seen a face nor even a distinguishable head, but now the
snakes face was made visible, and seeing its face suddenly made me feel so sad.
AC Family, don't you guys feel sad?
It's like the creature suddenly in my mind had a personality and spirit that had passed,
and it was tragic.
As I began to bury the creature, it dawned on me that this animal was no beast, but an
innocent life form.
It wasn't bad for desiring the young of ants.
It was born to eat ant babies, that was its role in nature, and it was just living its
life the way it knew how.
It made me realize in that moment that in the natural world nobody, no party, no creature,
plant nor lifeform, is the bad guy.
Even the savage black crazy ants that killed our Jawbreakers were also just doing what
they needed to do to live.
It wasn't their fault for wanting, well needing rather to kill our Jawbreakers.
Look at these weeds that have been springing up like an eye sore interupting the aesthetic
flow of our terrarium we constructed.
They weren't bad plants.
It's not their fault they're doing so well in an unoccupied space.
Though we humans can't help but be an empathic species at times, it does seem that in life,
all living things are the good guys, and we can sometimes forget that.
It's ant love forever.
Thanks for watching another episode of the AntsCanada Ant Channel!
AC Family, I've left a hidden cookie for you here if you would just like to see some extended
play footage of this Brahminy Blind Snake to the sounds of some relaxing music.
Let the video be a celebration of its life.
Also, AC Family, we need to name this terrarium so choose from any of these names from suggestions
made by you AC Inner Colony members from a previous hidden video, to finally give our
terrarium an official name!
And now it's time for the AC Question of the Week!
Last week, we asked:
What is the name of the venom which fire ants
inject when they sting?
Congratulations to Dudepool 365 who correctly answered:
Solenopsin
Congratulations Dudepool 365 you just won a free ebook handbook from our shop!
In this week's AC Question of the Week, we ask:
List one of the common names of the snake featured in this video?
Leave your answer in the comments section and you could win a free ant t-shirt from
our shop!
Hope you can subscribe to the channel as we upload every Saturday at 8AM EST.
Please remember to LIKE, COMMENT, SHARE, & SUBSCRIBE if you enjoyed this video to help us keep
making more.
It's ant love forever!