The Queen Termite
Page
The queen is the big one on top, much bigger than the king on the right, the worker on the left and the soldier in the middle.

Termites

Order Isoptera
("equal wings")


Termites have three body parts, the head, thorax and adbomen.

Termites have been on earth about 200,000,000
years and are related to cockroaches (ugh!).

Termites are good and bad. They eat dead wood in forests, recycling the wood into soil. In the United States, they cause more damage to homes than storms and fires together.


Chomp! Chomp! I love wood!
There are about 2,500 termite species in the world. North America has 41 termite species, most in the southeast USA. Alaska is the only state without termites.

Florida's eastern subterranean termite colonies have about 250,000 members, but can have1 million or more. A colony eats about 1 cubic foot of wood a year.

Australian colonies can have two million termites. The queen can lay 2,000 eggs per day and live as long as 50 years.

West African colonies can have five million members. In big nests the queen and king may live for 15 years. The queen will lay one egg every 15 seconds.

Termite colonies have a queen, a king, soldiers, and workers. Worker termites are male and female nymphs and sterile, wingless adults. Workers collect food, feed adults, build tunnels, and grow fungus (many species grow fungus gardens for food). Soldier termites are sterile adults with really big heads, built for protecting the colony..

The queen and king are the only termites with wings. A colony produces many queens and kings each season. They leave, swarm, mate, lose their wings and start a new colony. The queen lays about five eggs which she and the king look after. The queen feeds them regurgitated (already chewed up) food until they can eat on their own. After 2 years the new nest may still have as little as 10 workers and one soldier. Soldiers take about a year to mature. After a few more years the nest begins to release sexuals -- new kings and queens with wings to leave and start new colonies..

Different growth rates from egg stage to adult depend on individual species. Although the colony's one queen can lay tens of thousands of eggs in her lifetime, most eggs are laid by supplementary reproductives in an established colony.

One place you will not find termites is at my favorite restaurant, Norwood's. You should go there and try Norwood's famous Onion Rings.


I'm having a really bad hair day!


A special thanks to Dr. Anthony Curtis and BugO'Rama for their great termite
websites that helped me with this project..

If you enjoyed this site, you should visit the other sites my sister and I manage:

  • Chalet Ermina is the perfect bed and breakfast, nestled in the Swiss Alps.
  • Norwood's Restaurant has fresh seafood, super onion rings and 30,000 bottles of wine!
  • Would you like to know about African Porcupines?
  • Enjoy a collection of almost 100 Florida maps.
  • The Wood Stork, an endangered species.
  • The North American River Otter.
  • Our home page.
    Please mail comments and suggestions to: Jamie

    		•