I Built a Bridge Connecting All My Giant Vivariums Together

This is Pantora, my 1,000-gallon cloud rainforest vivarium, which is attached to a cave tunnel, leading to Hydromeda, my tropical wetlands vivarium, as well as to a glass bridge of branches, through the floor above, to Orcadia, my treetop canopy vivarium. I have called these three connected vivaria, Panchaea, as they have become a primordial superbiome, whose creatures within cross the bridges, free to inhabit whichever biological world and niche they so choose. And then last year, I created Verdantia, my lush and tropical grasslands vivarium, the juggernaut of tanks, with a space large enough to fit 15 people, housing a plethora of unique grassland creatures and plants. Since its creation, it has stood like an isolated island of life, at the back of my Ant Room's top floor, slowly bio-diversifying and fermenting its life within, waiting for its destined connection to Panchaea. But the time has come, and the creatures on both sides have no idea their worlds are about to open up, for the greatest of bridges has just been completed, uniting the old world with the new. Welcome, my Panchaean creatures, to Verdantia! Verdantia, you're finally one with Panchaea! Please SUBSCRIBE to my channel, and hit the BELL ICON. Welcome to the AC Family! Let's get to 7 million subs in this Season 7 of the Ecosystem Vivarium Series! Thank you for being part of this whole journey with me! Enjoy! Making all these alterations and renovations in the Ant Room, in my home, in order to accommodate our growing baby, our ecosystem, I realize might appear to some as a bit excessive, but honestly, someone's gotta do it, for my dream is to document the whole history of our growing ecosystem of tanks. This project has been over two epic years in the making, and AC Family, I know we are offering some significant scientific contributions to the understanding of ecosystems through this project, that will one day be important in the world and help us in some way. How? Not exactly sure yet, but Mother Nature has already taught us so much, and it's about to teach us a whole lot more, for this new bridge joining Verdantia and Orcadia is unlike the other two I've already made, and wait until you see why. But before opening up the bridge for business, I approach the heart of our ecosystem, Pantora, our rainforest floor vivarium, just to see how ready its residents would be for the great connection to Verdantia. Valentino, our resident green tree python, was sleeping like the old man he was on a top branch, as creatures scuttled by in the surrounding branches. A knight in shining armour, blue armour to be exact, scurried up the vine. It was a blue ant from the Sapphire Royals. The blue ants have been working overtime, foraging the upper foliage of Pantora for food, in preparation for the harsh dry season which was coming up fast, when resources would become much more scarce around these lands. Another worker came along and they exchanged collected food from their social stomachs, via trophallaxis, i.e. mouth to mouth regurgitation transfer. Their collections will be highly prized by the colony back home in their nest. Making things slightly inconvenient, though, were the menacing black crazy ants, the invasive dark horde, who are also being the pests they are. As usual, these guys have been actually waiting for the dry season because they love the heat, and their supercolonies grow faster when it's hot. In fact, speaking of which, a dark mass caught my eye in the leaf litter. It was an encampment of about 1,000 ants and a tonne of brood. This was one of their many temporary satellite nests scattered all over the rainforest. I scanned the encampment for a queen. Hmm... can't really find any. Can you? What has made these invasive black crazy ants so successful in our ecosystem, and in every tropical and subtropical country in the entire world for that matter, are a few things. First, their colonies have multiple queens, a condition called polygyny, which is advantageous because the colonies can grow quickly. Also, new queens can mate with their brothers without it causing genetic defects. They can mate inside the nest, not needing a nuptial flight like other ant species, and unrelated black crazy ant colonies can literally join forces peacefully if two or more colonies of black crazy ants meet. This is a lethal combination of biological features in a single ant species, the perfect recipe for an invasive ant. Hence, these ants have been so hard to get rid of in our forest even after two years. But all these ants here have no idea they're about to be food to a giant! A giant ant eater descended from the skies, sucking the colony into oblivion, and just like that, our ant eater enjoyed yet another meal of Dark Horde. This would help cut back on the Dark Horde's population, but not entirely eradicate them. But one concerning thing, the building of this new bridge between Verdantia and Arcadia is not only would our favourite critters be able to cross over to the grasslands, but so too would the dangerous ones, and I wasn't sure how strong the Dark Horde would become once they meet their compatriots on the other side. The Sagittarius army was fussing about the open soil of the grasslands, feasting on a dead cricket, when the giant ant eater came down to feast on them. These lands were home to the Sagittarius army, which I've also been doing my best to cut back on. This supercolony is even faster and stronger than the Dark Horde. I bet they're older, too, and who knows how much stronger they'd be once they ultimately meet the Dark Horde. They'll surely join forces. We just have to see. The strengthening of invasives wasn't on the top of my mind, though, because I felt this new bridge joining Verdantia and Arcadia would do more good than bad in our ecosystem. Now building this new bridge was quite the task. The team went in to clean the area and begin constructing the glass bridge on site. This glass bridge was designed with the help of my trusted friend and her poppiest, Ben, who also helped me build both Hydromeda and Verdantia. This non-AI video, using his architectural designing software, was the initial design we came up with. The glass bridge would sit on brackets jutting out of the wall and run along the top of the windows to bridge the two vivaria together. It took our team several days to work on this bridge, and they loved watching the vivaria during their breaks. Likewise, as the team was working in the Ant Room, all the creatures within the vivaria spied on the men building their future bridge. I don't think the animals could comprehend what was truly up ahead for them. Neither will you guys, AC Family! As the Verdantia Bridge was coming together, another major project was being born down in the lowlands. Godzilla, my young spectacled caiman, was asleep below the water's surface. With just the tip of his nostrils above the water, in nature this behavior would allow him to remain unseen below the water's surface, where he could be free from predators. As yes, even a 4ft crocodilian like him could fall prey to even larger animals, but where he was about to go, he wouldn't need to worry about that. The various tetras of the wetlands swam around, fat and older now. These fish, like all creatures, eventually age and I could see it in their slower and fatter bodies. I imagine they would make a great meal for Godzilla. Now, as I've mentioned in the past, as much as having our croc move into Hydromeda would look absolutely stunning, for about two minutes, knowing him, it wouldn't be long before he realized he was living in a buffet and would go on to eat every single fish, snail, shrimp, and creature he could catch. Hydromeda, as a biodiverse wetlands ecosystem, would cease to exist. But I've begun the planning stage for his next place of residence. Just across the pond, and adjacent to Pandora, is a stretch of empty space in front of this line of windows, and has been the spot I've been eyeing for months, as the location in the Ant Room to construct his next home. I would simply need to relocate the Leviathan's ant farm tank somewhere else. We're doing this, guys! I began to visualize in my head and trace with my hands the shape of the future enclosure as I saw it in my mind. This next build was going to be a first for me of its kind, one for which it would take me months to design and or order the various specialized parts needed, but I knew if I could be successful at making what I saw in my head a reality, it would be a truly phenomenal build. I knew it would take a lot of work and time still, so I would use this time over the next few months to do more research, especially on what flora and fauna would be inhabiting such a space. AC Family, mark this day as the day we begin the planning for Vivarium V. AC Family, behold! The new Verdantian Bridge, months of planning and 5 days of construction have all led to this glorious hall of glass, a portal between worlds. Let me show you around. This 30 ft or 9 m glass bridge is the longest, most spacious bridge between Viveria yet. It is lined with LED lighting that is synced with the entire ecosystem's photo period, so it turns on during the day and off at night. It also opens at each segment from the top, in case we need to go in and clean or something. This is the hole at the top of Verdantia, where I've tried to pull up some of the fig plant to start growing up there. I've placed a branch on the other side to give creatures a bridge down into the main bridge area. There is also of course an opening into the bridge from Orcadia, where I have fixed some fig leaves to extend upward to help critters access the opening. As discussed in previous videos, both ends of these two openings are fitted with wire filters with spacing large enough to allow insects, spiders, and geckos to pass, but small enough to keep key creatures like Valentino and the quails from accessing the bridge to cross over. These wire filters can be removed in case I change my mind in the future. By the way, guys, let me know what we should name this epic bridge, or should we just keep calling it the Verdantian Bridge? Let me know in the comments. I've placed a bristol board barrier to keep things from crossing over for now, but AC Family, the moment we've all been waiting for. removing the barrier, and just like that, our bridge was now open for residents on both sides to migrate. Verdantia, you are now part of the system! I just couldn't wait to see what creatures would cross over. I stayed up and watched, and watched, and watched. No creatures were passing the bridge. It was eventually too late, and I went to sleep. The next day, I also watched, and still no creatures crawled through, that I saw. I wondered if it was because the bridge was too dry, or perhaps too glassy and not enough organic elements. I was certain the smells from the grasslands was wafting into Arcadia, and vice versa, and was sure insects would want to check things out on the other side. How sad that this bridge didn't seem to be the highway I had hoped it would be, like the other two bridges. I think we may have to naturally decorate and landscape this bridge. What do you guys think? It does look a bit sterile and bare. Should it be another cave tunnel? Perhaps just some simple rocks and gravel? Plants? Let me know what you guys think. Either way, I was a bit sad that our bridge didn't seem to be bridging anything for the first two days. The next day, I approached Pandora and took a quick scan of the vivarium. I saw a lot of crickets, but I wasn't sure if any of them were from Verdantia. There was no way I could tell, but what I saw next absolutely floored me. It was on the Alocasia, a baby insect, but not just any baby insect. This was a Philippine katydid nymph, a creature of the grasslands that had to have found its way here to Pandora. Yay! The verdantian creatures were crossing the bridge, proof that the vivariums had already begun cross-pollinating life, or rather cross-populating life. This to me was like Verdantia and the Old World Pangaea holding hands. Our four vivaria had officially become one, thanks to the new bridge. Go and eat plants to your heart's desire, little one, and go back to call your friends, will ya? I was so happy! It doesn't seem like any of the ants have shown any interest at migration yet, not even the black crazy ants, thankfully, but I hear the giant ant eater will be ready to pick them off, if ever they're spotted trailing through here. But in other great news, while editing this video, I took a quick peek into the bridge today and found this little guy, a jumping spider, who had discovered the bridge. Bro, what do you think of this bridge? He has no idea! He's gonna love it here, especially if he's looking for food! Staring into our vivariums and watching the life within thrive and biodiversify, change and migrate into the various worlds we've created together within glass, is but a tiny God's eye view that I hope to never take for granted, in a world where we need to understand now more than ever, that each of us are members of a giant tapestry of life, equally valuable in a world that is big and multi-niched enough to support all of us. In my mind, the building of this bridge between worlds was a symbol and reminder that though each of us may be from far off locations of origin, we're all still united and belong here for a greater purpose. Even if we aren't exactly sure yet what that purpose is, surely one day, we'll find out. Until then, may we keep on building new bridges, for life! AC Family, I almost forgot! There's actually one more thing about this bridge I have to show you. Remember how I mentioned at the start of this video, that this bridge was unlike the other two? Well, there's a certain exciting feature I have been keeping secret from you guys for the longest time. Some of you may have spotted and have been wondering what this glass compartment is, attached below the Verdantian Bridge. Well, AC Family, I know you will all love this so so much! It's a feature that will kick this project up to a whole new level! Now you guys know how much I love to think outside the box, right? Well, do you see that black circle? That is a sticker, and can you guess what is behind that black sticker? Hint! Think outside the box! Vote in my community tab to affect this story!