Greetings, AC Family.
On this channel, we delve into the awesome and often shocking world of ants.
But today's video is just one of those videos that can be summed up in a four letter word
- EPIC!
AC Family, today I made the decision to take my chances and see what would happen if we
added giant tropical millipedes into the Hacienda Del Dorado, the estate of our Golden Empire.
The result which you will witness in this video, will hands down shock you!
You won't want to miss all the epic invertebrate action ahead, so trust me on this, keep on
watching until the end!
AC Fam, let's gather round the Golden Estate, and find out what happens when we add some
giants into our Golden Empire ant territory, in this week's episode of the AntsCanada Ant
Channel.
Please Subscribe to my channel and hit the bell icon.
Welcome to the AC Family, Enjoy!
So, let's begin with WHY I had to add these giant millipedes into the Hacienda Del Dorado.
If you have a look at these ant territories you will see that the plant growth is unbridled,
uncontrolled.
The plants are thriving and it is starting to get a bit crowded.
Thriving plant life is good, because it adds structure below the soil, which is perfect
for the ants' tunnels, and also adds landscape and humidity above ground.
The only drawback is I have to regularly trim the plants because some of them will go on
to grow past the ant barrier and hence offer a bridge of escape for the ants.
In last week's video, you may have seen that I was cutting these apro plants.
Now the thing is, these plant trimmings take a long time to decompose.
They simply lay on the ground and decompose naturally, which can take weeks or months.
Of course, it helps that the Hacienda Del Dorado is also home to colonies of miniature
creatures like isopods and springtails, which by the way thanks to a vote by you the AC
Family, are officially called the "Spring Cleaners".
But still, even with the Spring Cleaners, the plant matter took long to decompose.
As you can see here, at the site of last week's plant cuttings, the decaying plants are still
there.
And so, I felt this terrarium community required much larger helpers, chosen specifically to
feed on the decaying plant trimmings and speed up the decomposition process.
Introducing our chosen ones, Orthomorpha coarctata, tropical millipedes native to South East Asia.
They belong to a family of flat backed millipedes called Paradoxosomatidae, and boy do they
look interesting!
I caught these millipedes during a recent stay in the Philippine jungle.
They were everywhere and were clearly a very important decomposer of plant detritus.
Here we have 6 very active millipedes and most of them were captured as mating pairs.
I find these millipedes to be extremely promiscuous, always mating at every opportunity and with
various partners.
The fact that the millipedes were breeding was perfect because I knew that I not only
had both males and females, but that I could expect them to multiply and proliferate inside
the Hacienda Del Dorado.
Now the name Millipede means "thousand legs", but millipedes have much less, but still,
watching them move is truly a marvel.
Check out those legs moving in waves.
They can even move backwards!
Now AC Family, let's take a look at the risks involved with introducing creatures like these
into the Hacienda Del Dorado.
Of course, there was no telling how the ants of the Golden Empire were going to react to
our new multi-legged guests.
In the past we have found that anything large found in their territory, would be perceived
as a threat and/or dinner.
So, there was the obvious risk that the Golden Empire would completely devour these millipedes.
However, here's why I felt the millipedes had a good chance at withstanding the ants.
First, the millipedes impenetrable exoskeleton.
I find these millipedes to have some of the hardest, most solid exoskeletons around, and
when I say solid, I mean solid, for their size anyway.
I once fed a dead one of these millipedes to the Fire Nation, our red tropical fire
ants, and not even they could cut it open until it naturally decayed and by the then,
the good stuff had all dried up.
So, I expected that both the mandibles and formic acid of our yellow crazy ants would
not have been able to get past the millipedes' thick armour.
Also, speaking of acid spray, these millipedes have other tricks up their sleeves.
They possess glands which allow them to actually expel a defensive dark brown fluid containing
hydrochloric acid.
Take a look at these snap cap vials which I used to contain the millipedes on the way
back to my place.
You can clearly see the dried up blobs of defensive fluid.
It is enough to make animals sick, creatures die, and even bring about a bad reaction in
humans.
In fact, after shooting this video one of my eyes got super irritated for a few hours
due to the defensive fluids.
I knew, that these giant invertebrates were not defenseless weaklings, and in my mind,
if any larger creature were to survive the thousands of ants of the Golden Empire, it
would be these guys.
So AC Family, the time has come.
Time to add the millipedes.
If we can successfully pull this off, we will have a new crew, essential to the health of
this entire biological community that is the Hacienda Del Dorado.
The Golden Empire was going out their usual evening activities.
They were busy building and fortifying their tunnels, diligently.
Here you can see ants feasting on honey, and don't worry about those ants that look like
they are drowned.
They're not.
They're just stuck and when all this honey is sucked up by tomorrow, they will be freed.
I also made sure to feed the Golden Empire some extra cockroaches just to make sure they
were well-fed prior to this epic introduction.
So my plan, was to introduce one millipede first and see how the ants would react, and
gauge whether or not it was worth adding the others.
Here we go AC Family, time to add our first millipede.
Here we go 1-2-3.
The millipede is now inside the Hacienda Del Dorado.
Instantly, ants are all over it.
It isn't long before the millipede is swarmed by the Golden Empire.
Strangely, it seemed as if the millipede was calm and unaffected by the swarming ants.
It was hard to tell if the millipede how the millipede was feeling.
The millipede began to move and made its way to towards the foliage, with ants still hustling
about doing their best to subdue the massive creature.
The struggle continued.... and then the millipede disappeared into the foliage.
It was hard to tell if the millipede was injured or not.
It was evident that the Golden Empire was restless and were fully aware of their new
visitor.
I decided to take our chances.
It was time to add more millipedes, this time a breeding pair.
Instantly, the pair split up when they were met with a swarm of aggressive ants.
The male went on to flee towards the plants, while the female decided to take a dangerous
move.
She proceeded to enter one of the ant's nest entrances.
Let's watch what happens.
The female realizing she had made a huge mistake immediately scrambled as best she could to
climb out of the ant's den, but even with so many legs, she kept slipping off the loose
soil of the tunnel walls, and kept sliding back into the ant hole, met with swarms of
aggressive ants.
The male, too was doing his best to seek refuge from the angry ants.
The scene was heart-stopping!
She attempts to climb out again.
No good.
She slips right back in.
The male continues to look for a place to flee to.
The Golden Empire is angry as ever, trying their best to bite, subdue, and formic acid
spray the millipedes.
Will this be the end?
The female tries again.
She's almost out.
Oh no!
She slides back in again.
Things were not looking good for this female.
The male still seemed mobile and in a strange way, ok.
The female attempts another escape.
Yes, she's out.
She began to wander a bit and then strangely headed back for the hole she just came out
of.
No, don't go in there again!
The female moved towards to the plants for refuge.
I realized that perhaps the millipedes were at a disadvantage because they had no plant
cover to escape to, and also I was placing them directly near the ants' nest entrances.
So, I decided to release the final 3 millipedes in the dense plant foliage, so that they would
have a better chance at escaping the initial barrage of ants, perhaps even escape into
the shrubbery unnoticed.
I released the millipedes.
And as expected, very few ants were made aware of their presence, and they managed to escape,
unscathed.
That was it!
They needed to be released near cover and away from the ants.
I looked back at the mating pair that were still being attacked by the Golden Empire.
The female had disappeared around a corner out of sight.
I had no idea if she was going to survive.
When I looked at the male, my heart sank.
Sadly, he hadn't made it.
It looked as though the Golden Empire's acid sprays had been too much for the millipede.
The millipede's lifeless body lay motionless in the soil, as ants proceeded to continue
biting and spraying him with formic acid.
The dying millipede began to curl up into a ball.
He then fell into an ant hole, to be attacked further by the Golden Empire.
I felt so bad about this.
This was all my fault.
Watching this millipede die was truly heart-wrenching.
My guess was the other millipedes were also suffering a similar fate in some other sad
corner of the Hacienda Del Dorado.
Adding these millipedes was one very big miscalculation and a mistake.
Usually, when filming these nature videos, I make it a point to not interfere and to
simply allow nature to take its course, but I did that once, and it cost the lives of
dozens of newborns.
I did what I usually never do.
I went in to rescue the dying millipede from the ravaging ants.
What I saw next, shocked me to the very core.
The millipede was not dead, but was actually very much so alive and moving.
It seemed as though the ants' acid sprays and bites were indeed no match for the millipede's
tough exoskeleton.
I was right!
The millipede was alive, but it seemed it was just playing dead, until the ants would
leave him alone!
What a clever boy!
This brought so much hope!
My guess was that each one of the millipedes I placed inside were able to get away from
the ants by taking refuge in the thick plant cover or simply were able to fool the ants
by playing dead until they left it alone.
I won't know for sure until I see the millipedes again after tonight, but I will surely update
you if I do.
My guess, is each one of those millipedes are still alive and they will go on to feed
on our decaying plant matter in the Hacienda Del Dorado.
Let's hope they continue to breed and multiply.
And so, ends another epic day, AC Family, in the untamed and exotic world we call the
Hacienda Del Dorado, a biological community of which just got bigger.
Tonight I learned a valuable lesson: it seems as though you can take the wildlife out of
the wild, but you can't take the wild out of the wildlife.
Thanks for watching, AC Fam.
This is AntsCanada signing out.
It's ant love forever.
----
Woah, talk about plot twist!
Were you guys afraid and sad for the Millipedes, too?
It looks like they'll survive, but we'll see.
Let's keep our fingers crossed!
Ac Inner Colony, I've placed a hidden video here if you'd just like to watch more long
form footage of the ant-millipede battle without all the narration.
And now it's time for the AC Question of the Week.
Last week, we asked:
Name one of the three beneficial creatures that live with the ants in
the Hacienda Del Dorado.
Congratulations to Wolfee03 who correctly answered:
Springtails.
We also accepted aphids and isopods.
Congratulations Wilfee03 you just won a free AC test tube portal from our shop!
For this week's AC Question of the Week, we ask:
What type of acid can be found in the defensive fluids of the
millipedes in this video?
Leave your answer in the comments section and you could win a free ant t-shirt from
our shop!
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comment!
It's ant love forever!