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Book-lice and Their Allies — Part 3

In the most general terms the life of a termite colony is about as follows: After the so-called nuptial flight (which is made usually at a certain time of the year, and with Termes flavipes it is generally in the spring) composed of winged individuals of both sexes, male and female, and which always, except when it occurs in houses, attracts birds and other insect-eating creatures so that most of the individuals are destroyed, the wings of the survivors break off and they either pair and attempt to start a new colony or they drop in such a situation that workers from some old colony find them, join forces with them, and thus start a new community. The body of the true female, or queen, begins to swell with eggs, grows enormously, and egg-laying commences. Unlike the true ants or any of the other social Hymenoptera, the young require very little care from the workers. They are quite active and very soon feed themselves to some extent. The food of the termites is variable. It consists of wood fiber, or their own cast skins, or their excrement, or the contents of the stomach regurgitated by other individuals, or, in the case of the soldiers, they may eat dying or even healthy workers. The enlarged head and great jaws of the soldiers unfit them, in fact, for any other kind of food. They can not gnaw wood very well, and, as Sharp has expressed it, "their condition may be considered to be that of permanent hunger, only to be allayed by carnivorous proceedings." When the nest is disturbed and the soldiers get excited they dash their jaws around and frequently kill their fellows, but of course this is more or less accidental, since they have no eyes. When a Callotermes wishes food, according to Grassi, it strokes the posterior part of the body of another individual with its antennae and by some sort of a reflex action the contents of the alimentary canal of the individual stroked issue from the anus and are devoured by the stroker. The habitations of all termites are very cleanly, which is accounted for by the fact that they eat everything, the contents of the alimentary canal being eaten again and again until all nourishment has been taken out of it. Hubbard, in Jamaica, found that the young feed upon prepared food which is stored up in the form of very hard and tough round masses, some nests containing many pounds' weight. This material is softened by saliva before it can be eaten. The true queens can be distinguished at once by the stumps of their old wings as well as, later, by their enlarged abdomens; but there are in most colonies individuals known as supplementary queens, which are capable of reproduction up to a certain point and undoubtedly help to carry the colony on in case of the death of the true queen. These supplementary queens are undoubtedly female workers which have been fed in a certain way and which develop up to a certain point, although not to the point of becoming winged. One of these, found by Hubbard in the nests of Termes flavipes in Florida, is shown at Fig. 242.

In America Termes lucifugus has not been studied, but in Europe its history is rather well known. It burrows in wood of different kinds, makes excavations and builds galleries so that it can move from one point to another without being exposed. This suggests that we have as yet omitted to state that all termites shun the light, except during the nuptial flight; in fact, the workers and soldiers are almost invariably blind, although with certain African species of the genus Hodotermes facetted eyes occur in these castes and they issue from holes in the ground during the heat of the day and cut grass. There seems to be some question, however, whether these creatures really belong to this group. It is supposed also that these galleries keep the right degree of moisture, since in dry air these creatures die. Many thousands compose a community. The period of development apparently occupies from eighteen to twenty-three months.

Probably in the whole range of insects treated in this book there is no species which offers a better and more convenient field of study than the common Termes flavipes. I feel sure that what we know about it is but a small fraction of what remains to be learned, and it is everywhere so abundant that the earnest observer need never be without material.

Just as with the ants, and also with some of the social bees, so that we may, in fact, say just as with all social insects, in the habitations of termites will be found many guest insects. Such insects in ants' nests are known as Myrmecophilous; in termites' nests they are known as Termitophilous insects, and the study of these insects, in the United States, offers an almost unexplored field. Mr. E. A. Schwarz has paid some attention to them, and in the Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington (Vol. I, pp. 160, 161) has given a list of nine species of beetles found living in termites' nests and has published some very interesting notes about them. No true hymenopterous parasites of termites are known, unless the curious, big-headed chalcis flies of the genus Caratomus should prove to be parasitic upon them.