The Basic Principles Of Termite Control For Garden
Termites are detritivores, consuming dead plants at any degree of decomposition. They also play a very important role in the ecosystem by recycling waste material such as dead wood, faeces and plants.8182 Many species consume cellulose, having a specialised midgut that divides down the fibre.83 Termites are considered to be a significant source (11%) of atmospheric methane, one of the prime greenhouse gases, generated from the breakdown of cellulose.84 Termites rely primarily upon symbiotic protozoa (metamonads) and other microbes such as flagellate protists in their guts to digest the cellulose for them, allowing them to absorb the end products to their own use.8586 Gut protozoa, for example Trichonympha, in turn, rely on symbiotic bacteria embedded on their own decks to produce some of the necessary digestive enzymes.
Certain species like Gnathamitermes tubiformans have seasonal food customs. For example, they may preferentially consume Red three-awn (Aristida longiseta) during the summer, Buffalograss (Buchloe dactyloides) from May to August, and blue grama Bouteloua gracilis during spring, summer and autumn. Colonies of G. tubiformans consume less food in spring than they do during autumn when their feeding activity is high.91.
Numerous forests differ in their susceptibility to termite attack; the differences are attributed to these factors as moisture content, hardness, and resin and lignin content. In one study, the drywood termite Cryptotermes brevis strongly preferred poplar and walnut forests to other forests which were generally rejected from the termite colony.
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Some species of termite practice fungiculture. They maintain that a"garden" of specialised fungi of genus Termitomyces, which are nourished from the excrement of the insects. When the fungi are eaten, their spores pass undamaged through the intestines of their termites to complete the cycle by germinating in the fresh faecal pellets.9394 Molecular evidence suggests that the family Macrotermitinae developed agriculture roughly 31 million decades back.
Originally living in the rainforest, fungus farming allowed them to colonise the African savannah and other new environments, eventually expanding into Asia.95.
Depending on their feeding habits, termites are put into two classes: the lower termites and higher termites. The reduced termites predominately feed on wood. As wood is difficult to digest, termites want to consume fungus-infected wood because it is easier to digest and the fungi are high in protein. Meanwhile, the higher termites consume a wide variety of substances, including faeces, humus, grass, leaves and roots.96 The gut in the lower termites contains many species of bacteria along with protozoa, whereas the higher termites only have a few species of bacteria with no protozoa.97.
Termites are consumed by a vast array of predators. One termite species click now alone, Hodotermes mossambicus, was found in the stomach contents of 65 creatures and 19 mammals.98 Arthropods such as ants,99100 centipedes, cockroaches, crickets, dragonflies, scorpions and spiders,101 reptiles like lizards,102 and amphibians such as frogs103 and toads consume termites, together with two lions in the family Ammoxenidae being professional termite predators.104106 Other predators include aardvarks, aardwolves, anteaters, bats, bears, bilbies, many birds, echidnas, foxes, galagos, numbats, mice and pangolins.104107108109 The aardwolf is an insectivorous mammal that mostly feeds on termites; it finds its own foods by sound and by detecting the scent secreted by the soldiers; a single aardwolf is capable of consuming thousands of termites in a single night by using its long, sticky tongue.110111 Sloth bears break open mounds to consume the nestmates, whereas chimpanzees have developed resources to"fish" termites from their nest.
What Does Termite Control For Home Mean?
Among most predators, ants will be the best enemy to termites.99100 Some ant genera are specialist predators of termites. By way of instance, Megaponera is a strictly termite-eating (termitophagous) genus that execute raiding activities, some lasting a few hours.113114 Paltothyreus tarsatus is another termite-raiding species, together with every individual stacking as many termites as possible in its mandibles before returning home, all of the while recruiting additional nestmates to the raiding site through chemical trails.99 The Malaysian basicerotine ants Eurhopalothrix heliscata utilizes a different approach of termite hunting by pressing themselves into tight spaces, as they hunt through address rotting wood housing termite colonies.
