Termite Afternoon

After the first rain of the year I was anticipating a big eruption of termites in the evening where we would have to run around turning off lights in the house and then sweep the masses away from the veranda in the morning. But it didn't quite happen like that as there was no eruption in the evening at all. Perhaps it is still a little too early in the year and the new wings are not quite ready yet.

However, there was a small emergence in the afternoon while the rain was still falling. I think they are different species that fly during the daylight rather than after dark. There were only a few but it did give me a good chance to take some photographs and see more clearly what was going on.

The night-fliers always go for the lights thinking they are the moon and end up in a confused fluttering pile of chaos around street-lights and windows but these day-fliers stayed fairly low and well organised. I didn't see any go higher than the tops of our banana plants. Perhaps the drongos and bee-eaters make the skies too dangerous during the day.

Most stayed on plants but some found the telegraph poles just as useful.

This is known as their nuptial flight where potential queens and kings pair up and look for a good place back underground to start a new colony. This short flight is the only time they will ever be above ground. Only after sealing themselves in a chamber somewhere back in the ground will they mate, and unlike with ants who only mate once, a pair of termites will stay together for life, which can mean decades. So, apparently, the king has a life of nothing to do but eat and mate with his queen for perhaps twenty years or more! Sounds tough.

The brief part of their life I saw involved the females perching somewhere with their bottoms in the air and fluttering their wings. An alluring position to entice the males who were flying around. I imagine some kind of pheromone is also involved but it didn't work on me. Once they had paired off they dropped to the ground and quickly disappeared down one of the many cracks in our clay soil.

I also had a glimpse of the perils of the termites being so active out in the open. The first female I saw was still quite close to the ground and rather than being found by a male termite she was found by a large black ant. The ant's powerful bite finished her off quickly and she was dragged back underground to get recycled by the ant colony.

I know our garden is full of termites from the mounds that pop up and through finding their tunnels and chambers whilst digging. We also have an amazing number of ants, of several different species. I have a sense that there must be a titanic struggle going on, very finely balanced, between the termites and the ants. Unfortunately, it is mostly out of sight underground.

So this year I am still waiting for the real frenzy of an evening termite eruption but today's little burst was still fascinating.