It’s a Bugs Life… Part 2

Looking down a termite chimney

Sorry that it has been a while since I last wrote but let’s continue to get into the nitty gritty understandings of other cool creepy crawlies that I have found in and around Serian in the Mara…

So we have checked off the basics of moths and butterflies as well as damselflies and dragonflies so we now move onto ants V’s termites…

A few months ago a client asked all of us at lunch what the difference between a termite and an ant is and I completely hit a blank wall because flying ants and termites both have wings, the non flying ones don’t so that doesn’t distinguish the difference. Then I thought about what they ate; but you get the vegetarian ants and termites as well as the carnivores for both parties so that is also not a difference either. Where they live can also be rather similar as many live in social colonies so I went and did my research and this is what I came up with:

*Please see some pictures below which might help illustrate the differences.

ANTS	TERMITES
·         Ants have elbowed antennae	·         Termites have a beaded antennae
·         Winged ants have larger forewings than hind wings	·         Flying termites have equal sized forewings and hind wings
·         Ants have a segmented waist	·         Termites have a broad (non-segmented) waist
·         Ants have a pointed abdomen	·         Termites have a slightly more rounded abdomen
·         Ants complete full metamorphism	·         Termites have an incomplete metamorphism
·         Ants are scavengers	·         Termites are plant tissue specialists

Ant antennae's are elbowed

Termite antennae's are beaded

Ant abdomens are pointed

Termite abdomens are slightly rounded

Ant bodies are segmented

Termite bodies have a broad waist

The home of some ants

The home of black mound termites

And lastly a few cool facts:

·         Ants and termites belong to the largest insect family and there are an estimated 4tons per square hectare

·         Termites construct mud chimneys on top of their nests to keep it at an even temperature of 30.1°C (termites worldwide) to be able to make their fungus farms work

·         A queen termite can live up to 13 years

·         Ants can carry objects up to 50 times their weight