Termites live in highly organized colonies with different castes. Workers forage for food and feed other members. Soldiers defend the nest. Reproductives are winged or wingless. Colonies communicate chemically through pheromones to coordinate tasks and defense. When mature, winged reproductives swarm and shed wings to start new colonies.

1. SOCIAL BEHAVIOR
OF TERMITES
BY Chirag Dhankhar

2. Lets
know a
bit about
Termites
➢Commonly known as White ants.
➢They belong to Class- Insecta, Order- Isoptera.
➢Found in tropical, subtropical and temperate regions.
➢small, hemimetabolous, soft bodied, cellulose eating,
nocturnal
➢Light in colour
➢good decomposers of dead wood and vegetable products
➢more than 1,700 species of termites
➢all have similar genotype.

3. Social behavior of termites
They show a diverse kind of behavior with their environment
as they have a preplanned behavior with everything in their
surroundings
Here we talk about their some of social behaviors which
they show in their nests like :-
The Caste System
Getting Food and Feeding
Swarming
Defending the Nest
Communication

4. The Caste System
A termite community includes two
Castes :-
(i) Reproductive form or Fertile Caste
(i)Sterile form or Caste

5. Reproductive or Fertile Castes
There are three types of reproductive castes which are fertile
males and females. These are as follows :-
➢Macropterous forms or Winged forms
or First Reproductive Caste
➢Brachypterous forms or Short
winged forms or Second Reproductive
caste
➢Apterous or Wingless forms or Third
Reproductive caste

6. Macropterous forms
➢Sexually perfect males and females.
➢Have two pairs of large, equal-sized wings
➢Body is chitinous and dark brown.
➢Brain larger than in others.
➢Males and females leave the nest at
maturity
➢lead a brief aerial life, shed their wings at
the basal structures.
Female
male

7. More about Macropterous forms
After that they find a proper place for a new nest.
Each pair is a dealated King and Queen or Primary Royal Pair.
They have stumps of shed wings and they are monogamous.
The king and queen are permanently associated.
The queen becomes large by growth of its abdomen. The head
and thorax resemble a normal termite but her abdomen is
hugely distended, bulbous, long and white.
She produces up to 2,000 eggs per day.

8. Brachypterous forms
s
Secondary
Queen
Mature males and females.
Body is less chitinous.
Pale coloured and have short wing buds only.
They do not leave the nest
Substitute or complemental king or queen, which are
polygamous.

9. More About Brachypterous forms
They can live up to 5 to 7 years in some species.
Their compound eyes are not dark.
The brain and sex organs are smaller in size
Such queens produce fewer eggs
They are polygamous
If the primary king or queen dies, its place is taken by
brachypterous individuals forming several substitute or
complemental king or queen

10. Apterous
If queen dies in some adverse conditions or gets old, the
apterous neotenic reproductives are produced.
These are rare, found in lower termites only. They have both
males and females. These look like nymphal workers.
They have no wings, cuticle is colourless, compound eyes are
vestigial and ocelli are absent.
They are known as Ergatoid Kings and Queens.
They may be several in the colony

11. They are secondary reproductive with juvenile
morphological characters
Neotenics derive from immature forms (larvae,
nymphs, pseudergates or workers) through at
least one special moult.
In termites with distinct nymphal and apterous lines we
can distinguish nymphoid neotenies, derived from
nymphs, and ergatoid neotenies, derived from the
apterous line.
More about Apterous

12. Sterile forms or Castes
There are two types of wingless (apterous) , sterile
castes. These are male and females in which sex
organs are rudimentary and non-functional.
These are of two types:
Sterile Workers
Sterile Soldiers

13. Sterile Workers
These are the smallest in size, look like
nymphs, their body is pale coloured
and their integument is less chitinised.
Compound eyes and ocelli are absent and
the head is wide, pointing downwards.
They are about 60,000 to 2,00,000. They
mature within a year and live from 3 to 5
years
With the exception of reproduction and
defense, they perform all the duties of
the colony.

14. A little more about Sterile Workers
Their duties are take care the eggs and the young, finding food,
planting and cultivating fungi, making nests and feeding the
queen and soldiers.
They have gnawing habit. The workers destroy crops, wood and
human belongings and cause tremendous loss to man.
They are xylophagous, feeding on wood. They can digest cellulose
with the help of intestinal symbiotic flagellates –Trichonympha,
which are passed on from generation to generation.
They mature within a year and live from 3 to 5 years.

15. Sterile Soldiers
These are apterous males and females with no sex organs.
They are less numerous in the colony than workers.
A soldier has a large, dark coloured, chitinous head and big
mandibles. The colour of the body is pale. They must be fed
by the workers because they cannot feed themselves.
They defend the community. At times they plug the
opening of the burrow with their heads.
During the early months of formation of a new colony
workers and soldiers are only formed.

16. More About Soldiers
An intruder is instantly recognized and an alarm pheromone is
secreted that triggers the soldiers to attack.
Soldiers are of two types :
(i) Mandibulate soldiers – have large powerful
mandibles but no frontal rostrum.
(II) Nasute soldiers – have small mandibles and median
frontal rostrum on the head.
During emergence, the soldiers guard the exit holes, not only to
prevent entry of enemies but also to prevent alates from re-
entering the nest.

17. Getting Food and Feeding
Some termites can cover more than 300 feet while foraging for food.
They partially eat and digest the food before distributing it to
other members of the colony.
The worker termites are responsible for foraging for food for the
colony, as well as for feeding the soldier termites and the larvae.

18. Worker termites are the only ones that have the
proteins necessary to digest cellulose.
Soldier termites cannot feed themselves because of
their large mandibles, so they have to be fed.
Workers also drop the partially digested food into the
mouths of the larvae, kind of like a mother bird to her
babies.
Food and Feeding continued

19. The food of termites is mainly cellulose, which is obtained
from wood, grass, leaves, humus, manure of herbivorous
animals, and materials of vegetative origin
Most lower termites and many higher ones feed on wood that
is either sound or partly decayed.

20. Swarming
Swarming occurs for feeding, migration and mating. It also occurs as a means of
alleviating congestion in the overcrowded colony or as a means of distribution.
Usually equal number of males and females of macropterous and brachypterous
forms leave their nest, in huge numbers or great swarms, after the first showers
of rain on the onset of rainy season.
Swarming may occur at night or even during day time, depending on the species.
After a short flight they come down to the ground, their wings are shed off and
they become dealated.

21. Swarming continued
One male and a female pair, search for a sheltered place
either in wood or on the ground. They are known as royal
couple.
These individuals now become the originators of a new colony.
These nymphs develop into workers. When the workers are
formed in large numbers , they take up different duties like,
feeding and attending the royal pair and enlarging the nest.
During the early months of formation of a new colony
workers and soldiers are only formed.
Later on macropterous and brachypterous forms are produced.

22. Defending the Nest
As you might expect, the soldier termites are responsible for
defending the nest and protecting the king and queen and the eggs.
The number of soldiers in a colony depends on its size.
Soldier termites have oversized jaws that allow them to inject
poison into pests that attack the nest.

23. The colony will put more resources toward establishing
itself to start, so there will be more workers when the
colony is young.
As the colony grows and becomes more established,
more termites will become soldiers to defend it.
Species uses chemical reaction to drive toxicity of their
"explosive backpacks".

24. Communication
Termites communicate primarily by secreting chemicals called
pheromones or ectohormones.
Each colony develops its own characteristic odour.
An intruder is instantly recognized and an alarm pheromone is
secreted that triggers the soldiers to attack.
The proportion of termites in each caste within the colony is also
regulated chemically.

25. Termites Following Pheromones
Chemical Communication
Pic.

26. Communication Continued
If a worker finds a new source of food, it lays a chemical trail
for others to follow.
The proportion of termites in each caste within the colony is
also regulated chemically.
Nymphs or immatures can develop into workers, soldiers or
reproductive adults depending on colony needs.
Sound is other means of communication. The Soldiers and workers
may bang their heads against the walls by others and serving to
mobilize the colony to defend itself.
Mutual exchange of foods enhances recognition of the members