20 replies to this topic

[LC3]

Currently I'm keeping 3 species of termites, Reticulitermes cf. hesperus (Western subterranean termite), Zootermopsis angusticollis (Western dampwood termite) and an unidentified (possibly undocumented) dry wood termite, I think it's an Incisitermes sp.

Both the Z. angusticollis and R. cf. hesperus are from Vancouver island, south of Victoria in some forests in Metchosin.
The unknown termite species are from the dyke (coast of this island) and collected during a swarm.

 

[September 18th] Zootermopsis angusticollis:

September 6th

September 16th

September 16th

The colony originally had 5 soldiers, and a soldier nymph as well as a bunch of larvae (nymphs), but I accidentally drowned a lot of them. Anyways one soldier was left but it was eaten by the workers. Anyways a bunch of sticks allocated in a container won't be sufficient.

After arriving home the dampwoods on here were swarming sometime from 9PM to 11PM. Spent 3 hours camping my porch light, I ended up with 11 alates. I put these in a tube of moist wood (all of them) after they wouldn't tandem run and form their own pairs. Long story short, the extra guy was left to die, all the others formed pairs and everyone fought to the death, one pair was left standing.

They haven't grown as it will take at least 2 months for any eggs to hatch into nymphs, and termites are pretty aware of how much resources they have so it's unlikely they will even lay more eggs.
 

September 6th, dead bodies = mold

During this time they've laid 4 eggs

September 16th, about a few days ago they've cleared out a lot of mold, not sure how or what happened to said mold but they aren't dead so it's fine. If I remember correctly sometimes drampwoods will eat mold infested wood because it's easier and provides more nutrients.

September 16th, they've laid something around 6 eggs so far. Give them 6 months and they should hatch into larvae (nymphs)

[September 18th] Reticulitermes cf. hesperus:

Now onto Subterranean termites. These termites are a fragment of a larger termite colony. I believe this termite species is Reticulitermes hesperus. The Western Subterranean Termite

I gathered a couple of dozen workers, around 5 soldiers, and a bunch of nymphs/secondary reproductives. A lot died on the way and more then half of the ones I collected have died.

As of now they have 2 soldiers (molted from workers), most of the nymphs/secondary reproductives are ok, and the colony has produced a secondary reproductive, at least a female.
 

September 16th.

Their setup is pretty much a bunch of sticks and dirt. as long as they have wood and dirt they're good.

September 16th

Probably shouldn't have busted the nest open, but I needed a soldier. It died later for some reason not sure why. They're really fragile.

September 16th

This is a soldier. Notice on the second image that node on the top front end of the head capsule. I'm not sure what this node is for, maybe it's used to store a gland, I'm not sure.
It's possible the node is used for phragmosis, although most Reticulitermes spp. (and mandibular termites by far) use their heads for this purpose. Reticulitermes tilts its head 45 degrees and aligning the upward pointing mandibles nearly parallel to the ground. As of now I think the node serving as a pragmatic device is the most likely. This node seems to be pretty evident on R. hesperus, not so much on some other species like R. flavipes.
 

September 16th.

Secondary reproductive, this one is probably an adultoid neotenic

Spoiler

Termite caste differentiation and stuff is pretty complicated depending on the species, usually there's much more plasticity in regards to lower termites. Out of all the lower termites, Reticulitermes has one of the most modifiable caste differentiation systems. This plasticity can be attributed to the fact that a lot of lower termites and more primitive species don't have a worker caste but pseudergates, AKA a nymph that does worker stuff. So technically the workers aren't adults.

Black arrows: Development pattern
Green arrows: Adult development
Red arrows: Regressive molt
Pink: Secondary reproductive, Blue: Primary reproductive, Cyan: Founds colonies,
Red: Immature, Black: Steril, Yellow: Colony defense, Green: Does all the eating stuff homeowners hate

PR = Primary reproductives
EG = Egg
LN = Larvae(nymph) (Baby termites)
WK = Worker/Pseudergates (Does the labour, can develop into nymph, presoldier and a secondary reproductive)
ER = Ergatoid (Egg laying worker, really rare in nature since it usually requires all reproductives to not be present)
APN = Apterous neotenic (Secondary reproductive developed from workers, acts as supplementary reproductive)
PS = Presoldier (Develops into soldier)
SD = Soldier (Defends colony)
NY = Nymph (Can develop into a reproductive caste)
IN = Imago/alate nymph (Develops into alate)
BN = Brachypterous neotenic (Secondary reproductive, acts as supplementary reproductive)
AN = Adultoid neotenic (Secondary reproductive, acts as supplementary reproductive)
AR = Adultoid neotenic as primary reproductive (If the primary queen dies, neotenics can replace the queen)

This system varies by species of course, and I'm not even sure if I got the Reticulitermes version (The one this chart is based off of) is correct.

 

[September 18th] drywood cf. Incisitermes. (Termite sp1.)

September 16th. As of currently 2 inside the tube of wood are dead, the two in the bean snap-on container are doing pretty good.

I'm planning to go out to look for more or any evidence of drywoods from where I found them. Due to the fact that it's a wildlife protection zone I probably won't be very successful.

 

The wings of said species. These probably aren't a set, a lot of them ended up being chewed up.

Cryptotermes brevis (Indian powder dust termite)

Kalotermes approximatus lots of wing veins, pretty thick top wing veins (Not sure what they're called)

Incisitermes minor wing.

Termite sp1.

Incisitermes wing specimen from above.

A: median wing veins,
B: End of top wing veins
C: Cross veins. Net like veins covering top part of wing.
D: 2nd median wing vein splits to many wing veins lining the underside of the wing and back half. (Some veins descend from top wing veins at the end of wing)
 

Termite sp1.

A : Single median wing vein
B: Top wing vein curves around the wing.
C: Median wing vein splits to merge with another vein from the lower top vein, forming a triangle and bending downwards.
D: Very shallow cross veins.
E: Triangle formed from median wing vein and extension from top wing vein
F: Single median wing vein splits into many wing veins with net like structure for lower half of wing.
G: Heavily netted top upper half of wing.


I'm not able to find detailed images of I. minor wings, a lot of wings attributed to I.minor or drywoods are either not specified or not good enough to distinguish detail.
 

This is a very detailed drawing of I. snyderi wing I found on the Mississippi Entomological Museum website. Looks a lot like I. minor wing (two median wing vein, top wing veins end abruptly, many veins splitting off from the lower median wing)

Anyways as shown above the termite wing of Termite sp1. lacks a median vien that seems to be found in other drywoods. Compared to I. minor the wing is also much more netted, as there are many veins connecting the bottom veins diverging from the median vein. The top netted part of the wing above the median vein is larger then what's typical of drywoods. The median wing vein of Termite sp1. nearly stretches over the entire wing. Top cross veins are pretty typical, but the top veins of this species tends to curve and thicken around the edges as opposed to the abrupt ending before the curvature shown by Incisitermes spp.

Really the entire thing looks more like the morphology of a dampwood termite wing, but damp wood wings tend to be very thin, larger, lighter and contain less veins.

Edited by LC3, October 8 2018 - 12:54 AM.

[LC3]

Wing of Z. angusticollis beside fecal pellets of Termite sp1.

fecal pellets of Termite sp1 are cone shaped, dry and hexagonal compared to Zootermopsis which produced cylindrical wet pellets.

 

Anyways feel free to help on my investigation thingee.

 

Here take this video of Zootermopsis angusticollis nymph or worker molting in case you're not bored enough.

 

Spoiler

Sorry can't get the last 3 links to work on the main post, seems like it will only support a certain limit of pictures and whatever.

Edited by LC3, September 18 2017 - 8:59 PM.

[Studio]

Very interesting, I like the videos, pictures and details. Keep up posted!

 

I've kept a pair of drywood termites before in a testube setup. They laid 1 egg and and it took a year for them to have 1 worker. I figured it wasn't for me and donated them.

[LC3]

[September/19/2017]

I went to the dyke, damaged an ecosystem, technically didn't break the law I think and got some useful data.

Turns out that these might actually be a dampwood termite or at least a termite that nests in dampwood. I'm not sure.

September/19/2017

Side by side comparison of the workers. Even though most of the termite sp1 are neotenics reproductive nymphs

Zootermopsis angusticollis worker



Termite sp1. worker. Won't sit still.

Compared to Z. angusticollis, T. sp1 has a more prominent pronotum, the last two segments are much more pronounced then Z.angusticollis and are clearly distinguishable from the abdomen. The head of Z.angusticollis is also much more rounded, it's pretty much completely round and is nearly twice the length of the pronotum. Compared to T. sp1 which has rounded top end but eventually lead to a triangle where the jaws meet. (This is why I thought they were drywoods to begin with, for the imagos the head was nearly the same width as the pronotum if looked from above). The head of Z. angusticollis is also smooth while T. sp1 has a few shallow lumplike markings around the front of the head. The most distinguishing feature though is the eyes. Z. angusticollis do not have eyes (At least not this pronounced), they are blind. This species also has a much more elongated abdomen.

At the sites where termite damage was evident I found both hexagonal shrunken pellets like drywoods and wet cylindrical ones mixed together in the same areas. Gallows of this termite species were less flat compared to Zootermopsis and follow the grain of the wood like both drywoods and dampwoods. It seems this species is capable of making a muddy mix of its own feces like dampwoods. These were the only termites I found there, no sign of Zootermopsis angusticollis workers or purely cylindrical wet pellets.

Gallows made by this species are frequently occupied by other insects and ants, out of all the gallows there (pretty much on any wood) only two logs contained termites within the first few cm underneath the bark.

Termite gallows were home to spiders, a solitary mud-wasp of some sort I believe, hibernating hornets, various beetles, mostly Ampedus cordifer, moth larvae, woodlouse, various species of centipede and millipede, wood eating mites, springtails, booklice, and earthworms.

However the most abundant occupier of gallows are Myrmica incompleta, en average I'd say they seem to make up around 40-60% of all the things living in the gallows including termites. Other ants I found are Tapinoma sessile (One colony nesting in wood with evidence of termite damage) and Leptothorax muscorum. The interesting thing is in some of the wood, particularly the ones with exposed rotting wood, there were tons upon tons of dismembered parts of Camponotus modoc. Whether this was competition between colonies, or against M. incompleta or T. sp1. I have no clue. Termites often nested in very close proximity of M. incompleta.

The termites themselves occurred in pretty low density, like I said out of the one large log I messed with, I only counted around 4 or 5 pockets of 1-6 termites within a few centimeters under the wood. The weird part that sticks out to me is that nearly all of them were neotenics. It's quite late in the year so they may be hibernating or something. I'll check if their feeding habit or whatnot increases during spring or late summer next year.

Sorry for lack of pictures, technical malfunction.

the thicker darker wings, small head ratio to pronotum, harder exoskeleton, elongated abdomen, shrunken hexagonal fecal pellets are all in line with characteristics of drywoods but the behaviour and nesting habit clearly defines this species as a dampwood.

Random hypothesis I'm going to throw out. This termite is a dampwood, and like other dampwoods are in the family of Termopsidae. The drywood features evolved in this particular termite to cope with the dry summers here, that would make them highly adaptable and suited to live in the environment where they are from. They can't tunnel because of heavy vegetation and competition from ants so they've evolved to make due with sitting in a log for their entire lives. This is likely the case as the wing morphologies of this species match up more to those of Zootermopsis then Kalotermes and Incisitermes.

Edited by LC3, November 3 2017 - 2:57 PM.

[LC3]

[Oct/02/2017]

 

Reticulitermes cf. hesperus

Unfortunately the Reticulitermes had a huge die off from dehydration. The secondary reproductive (Which I now know to be a brachypterous neotenic) is healthy and so are most of the nymphs and a soldier but most of the workers have died. Fortunately the neotenic and the nymphs are capable of fending for themselves, to some degree. I've put them in a new setup and hopefully they regroup and found a new colony, although it may take a while.

I'm not sure what caused this sudden dehydration, I believe I watered them a few days ago and looking through the damage they've done to the wood they were doing pretty good, quite a few mudtubes, every wood had some tunnel in it. I left them in the open air setup (which was temporary) originally because I didn't want to disturb them.

 

Zootermopsis angusticollis.

 

I opt to calling these colonies Z. angusticollis VanIsl and Z. angusticollis RichWC, (Vancouver and Richmond West Coast respectively)

 

Z. angusticollis VanIsl:

This colony has been doing great so far, I'm not sure if they have any larvae yet but a lot of workers have been molting, so it seems like they aren't under stress. 

Fecal pellet constructions and wood damage from Z. angusticollis, October 2nd, 2017

 

This colony has a tendency to build "mud blankets" they're in a closed environment so I believe these are for regulating moisture as opposed to defense. October 2nd, 2017

 

October 2nd 2017

 

Z. angusticollis RimdBC:

Queen and king are still eating and have stopped laying eggs (normal for termites). Last time I counted there were around 10. These eggs should be hatching in abouter 4 or so more months. The test tube water has started growing Serratia marcescens. Not very uncommon for test tube water but I'm not sure how it will affect the termites and their gut microbiome. They're also starting to ware a bit thin on wood but I can't really do anything about either of these.

 

October 2nd 2017

Eggs, just a few more months left until they hatch.

 

Termite sp.1

 

Still haven't figured out what termite species they are. I need to refill their containers with wood again and move them to better setups. 

 

Hexagonal pellet similar to drywood termite species. The pellets still seem to retain their cone shape even when the termites feed on wet wood, somewhat.

 

October 2nd, 2017

Now that the imagos have fattened up a bit, they look a lot more like Z. angusticollis besides colour. Although the head is still smaller in proportion, slightly angular, and more thin when looking from the side. 

 

October 2nd 2017

I haven't been able to find more of these in the wild, but then again I haven't been really trying to either, I've found a few random openings in less damaged and intact wood that lead to gallows like termites but they may be caused by anything (although they probably are caused by termites), any other wood that it damaged enough to reveal a few inner galleries are abandoned and overrun with Myrmica incompleta. I'm still not sure how they sustain themselves as a species with such little wood around the area. The dyke is apparently a giant restoration project to make up for the habitat loss caused by the construction of YVR (Vancouver International Airport) and is primarily aimed to protect birds. There's a possibility these termites were here before the restoration project and existed in a different environment. I'll do more research on the Restoration project and the documented wildlife later.

 

On another note I've found these images on bugguide

http://bugguide.net/node/view/1013183

This specimen, (doesn't look like Z. angusticollis in my opinion) has wings nearly identical to Z. angusticollis being very light, but has a really angulate head, more so then the ones I've found.

 

http://bugguide.net/node/view/148358

This specimen looks nearly identical to the ones I have, dark thicker looking wings, slightly rectangular head, smaller head proportions and rounded posterior end of the head. They still might not be the same species though given the distance.

Edited by LC3, November 1 2017 - 6:21 PM.

[LC3]

[Oct/03/2017]

 

No sign of the Reticulitermes hesperus in their new container. I found one worker alive and one or two dead. There's a possibility the rest of the workers/remaining have recovered.

[LC3]

[Nov/01/2017]

 

Reticulitermes hesperus

Haven't really checked on them, I've seen at most two workers.

 

Zootermopsis angusticollis

 

Z. angusticollis VanIsl:

The colony I collected at Vancouver Island has laid a cluster of 20 or so eggs (Twice as much, nearly 40 eggs actually ) at the bottom of the container. Since they are already established it should take roughly 1-2 months for them to hatch.

October 27th 

According to GC (Chatroom) this looks like fried chicken. 

 

Workers headbanging, not to heavy metal however.

 

Z. angusticollis RimdBC:

Two nymphs hatched from the eggs . Right on schedule I think, they laid these eggs around 3 or 4 months ago, a bit early for them to hatch but 3-4 months for the first eggs to hatch isn't unheard of I think. They're so tiny, and pretty clumsy, and generally don't seem like they have a clue on what they're doing. I'm surprised that the imagos don't accidentally kill them by walking over them. The eggs start off looking like a clear gelatin yellow being slightly rounded rods in shape,  eventually they grow a bit and start turning a cloudy whitish colour. They look pretty much like Camponotus eggs at that point. Then they hatch. There's still around 6 or so eggs left.They actually have 13. 

 

Termite sp.1

The imagos haven't killed each other and are doing good, same goes for the group of nymphs or neotenics (I believe they are actually nymphs) and that one worker. The pair of 3 imagos laid two eggs but I think they might have ate them, probably because they felt the wood they were given was unsustainable or didn't feel secure enough.  

 

I've been browsing on INaturalist in the Zootermopsis section and I've noticed a lot of peculiar looking termite alates around the northern half of Washington, most of these specimens were observed along the north west and western half of the mountains, there was one swarm witnessed by WeatherAnt that featured brown alates and I'm assuming that was in the east. They differ in subtle traits, like darker wings, some have triangularish heads, some . All of them are dark brown in colour. Apparently Zootermopsis is one of the more well studied genre of termites so I'm not sure if anyone has noticed this already. I've found a few completely brown specimens on the site in California and one in Oregon. For the Californian specimens there might be a chance that it is Z. nevadensis. Other then 

 

October 24th

Egg, compared to Z. angusticollis, these termites have more oblong and peanutty lobed shaped eggs, they look like peanuts in my opinion. They're also lighter in colour. This might be an unfertilized egg although I don't think it's likely as termites mate before laying eggs. 

 

I'll post pictures of the Z. angusticollis eggs (and nymphs) later.

Edited by LC3, January 20 2018 - 2:21 PM.

[T.C.]

Awesome. Although, it's not Nov,11th?

[Connectimyrmex]

I'm caring for 2 R. flavipes alate nymphs, and I was just wondering: are you caring for your termite reproductive nymphs just like your adult reproductives? 

By the way, the Termite sp.1 "secondary reproductives" are the reproductive nymphs, which will molt into alates next year.

Edited by Connectimyrmex, November 2 2017 - 9:06 AM.

[LC3]

Awesome. Although, it's not Nov,11th?

Oops. My bad.

 

I'm caring for 2 R. flavipes alate nymphs, and I was just wondering: are you caring for your termite reproductive nymphs just like your adult reproductives? 

By the way, the Termite sp.1 "secondary reproductives" are the reproductive nymphs, which will molt into alates next year.

Yeah I figured they were the reproductive nymphs. I'm not exactly sure if they will molt into alates or molt to become a neotenic next year or this year, or any of the following years. If they feel that they're still in a colony they might become neotenics but I'm pretty sure under the current circumstances they'll molt into alates or do nothing.

Edited by LC3, November 2 2017 - 12:51 PM.

[Connectimyrmex]

 

Awesome. Although, it's not Nov,11th?

Oops. My bad.

 

I'm caring for 2 R. flavipes alate nymphs, and I was just wondering: are you caring for your termite reproductive nymphs just like your adult reproductives? 

By the way, the Termite sp.1 "secondary reproductives" are the reproductive nymphs, which will molt into alates next year.

Yeah I figured they were the reproductive nymphs. I'm not exactly sure if they will molt into alates or molt to become a neotenic next year or this year, or any of the following years. If they feel that they're still in a colony they might become neotenics but I'm pretty sure under the current circumstances they'll molt into alates or do nothing.

 

They will molt into alates. Thankfully, termite alates do not need to fly to bond, just break off their wings and put them on the floor to get into the tandem running mood. That's what I did with the drywood termites from back in hawaii (they always got stuck in the kickout hole)

[LC3]

[January/15/2018]

 

So a lot has happened since I updated this journal. To give a quick rundown, the Subterranean termites are still alive and well even though it's just a handful of workers, the Zootermopsis angusticollis colony I got from Vancouver Island is exploding, the Z. angusticollis colony I raised is still raising larvae and having them mysteriously disappear. Termite sp. 1 is probably Z. cf. nevadensis nuttingi, they also have raised one larva. I also lost most of my pics that I took which is mostly why I haven't updated this journal.

 

Reticulitermes hesperus

Handful of workers, found around 4 last time crammed in one piece of wood. I have no idea if they will recover or not but the ones I found were doing healthy. They barricaded that piece of wood last I checked.

 

Zootermopsis angusticollis

 

Z. angusticollis VanIsl:

 

Colony is booming in population. I've still been feeding them dead pine wood although the latter pieces are more fresh (since it's winter and not a lot of easily accessible rotting wood lying around)

Z. angusticollis larvae. They wander around a lot. Found them everywhere in anything from tiny crevices to the surface, both places where workers will not go.

 

Z. angusticollis RimdBC: 

Still raising larvae, and still finding them to be gone. They raised two of them to around late instar when one disappeared. Last time I saw the other one was when it was probably a molt or two away from becoming a young adult. They have dug around the wood extensively so it's possible they've just never been present whenever I bother to look at them.

 

 

[Nov/12/2017]

 

 

[Jan/12/2018]

 

Zootermopsis cf. nevadensis 

 

The bunch of alate nymphs are down to four.

 

The imagos are still coexisting fine, can confirm there is a male and female in there since I saw two of them mating at some point. Looks like the egg they had is still there since they manage to raise a larva . I think thy look a lot more worker like compared to the Z. angusticollis at a similar stage.

 

Based on the time it probably took no more then 3 months to hatch.

 

 

 

[Dec/08/2017]

 

 

[Jan/12/2018]

 

Like the Z. angusticollis larvae they walk around a lot. This one was just walking in circles around the container.

Edited by LC3, January 16 2018 - 3:34 PM.

[Connectimyrmex]

Those nymphs are adorable

[LC3]

[April/13/2018]

 

Reticulitermes hesperus

I am fairly certain these are all dead by now, haven't seen any sign of activity.

I might go look for more this year.

 

Zootermopsis angusticollis

 

Z. angusticollis VanIsl:

I haven't really been paying attention to these guys and they have made an absolute mess. Virtually abandoning the lower levels with almost all of the wood destroyed and converted into pellets. They see to have reached the maximum population that container in its current state can sustain.  I did find out that they will eat hard boiled egg yolk interestingly. I am not sure how fond of yolk they are or how they digest it for that matter. It appears they don't tend to eat all that much. Some of that weird cottony looking fungus also grew on the egg yolk.

 

Also it feels exactly like cotton too, it's sort of springy and tough. After I threw away the fungus a few pieces clicked in my mind and I realized two things; this fungus seems to grow exclusively on protein and that I have never seen it elsewhere. I find it odd that it grew both in my Z. angusticollis setups but never in the Z. cf. nevadensis or any other setup for that matter. It may possibly have hitched a ride on the pine wood but the termites might also be possible carriers.

I should run some experiments.

 

March 1, 2018

March 3/4, 2018

 

Z. angusticollis RimdBC

 

This colony seems to be doing exceptionally well, I'm just waiting for them to accidentally drown themselves. That aside they have also produced a soldier

In termites it seems rather common for soldiers to be produced early on although they do tend to be much smaller (this one looks like it's around half or less of their maximum size). Those fellow 9 imagoes also helped probably. The workers tend to groom the soldier a lot.

 

 

Presoldier, March 9, 2018

Soldier upon molting, mid March probably

March 30, 2018

April 7, 2018

 

March 9, 2018

March something

April 7, 2018

Zootermopsis cf. nevadensis

 

 

I moved these into a test tube a two or three weeks ago with wood from where I found them. They are starting to settle but slowly. The three and their one worker are still getting along.

 

All four of the nymphs are basically dead, I am not exactly sure how or why either.

 

 EDIT: Nope they settled. They just laid an egg. This one looks more elongated then the last one.

Edited by LC3, April 13 2018 - 10:52 PM.

[Connectimyrmex]

Glad to see that your termites are doing great!
I've seen that mold in my termitat (which has dampwood termites). Maybe the mold is commensal.

[Scrixx]

This is a great journal. It's really detailed. Keep it up! I'll be following along.

[LC3]

[April/13/2018]

 

Zootermopsis angusticollis

 

Z. angusticollis VanIsl:

 

As stated last time they did reach the maximum population the container and amount of wood was capable of sustaining. I moved them to a larger container, didn't find a whole lot of larvae but they still were hatching (and probably laying). Compared to the dozens when I first got them I only counted maybe a dozen at most this time. two more pseudergates grew wing buds and one of the imagoes have died (I think, am not sure). Additionally the colony produced a soldier, maximum length too it seems.

 

May 12th, 2018

 

Their attack pattern is pretty well documented in literature. Not that much different then other biting termites. They do tend to be much less 'kamikaze' compared to other soldiers, they'll nearly always be hiding in a hole. I've also noticed they only will fight things if you hover whatever in front of them, touch them and they panic which I find kind of funny. I don't know what would happen if you say hello at a Zootermopsis soldier though.

 

Anyways the thing is about 2cm (20mm) long (I don't know for sure, it won't stay still), which is I believe the largest termite soldier in the world. Possible contenders are Z. laticeps or certain Macrotermes spp.  It's twice as long as the other colony's soldier (which is more in the same size range as your average tropical decently large termite (6-12mm).

 

 

Z. angusticollis RimdBC

 

Thiscolony finally realized how to not risk drowning themselves.

May 22nd, 2018

 

I also caught them licking the aforementioned cottony fungus. Tube use to be covered in a thin layer, it's all gone now.

 

Zootermopsis nevadensis

 

After molting their only worker died for some reason. One of the eggs just hatched today which means it took their eggs a month and around two weeks to hatch, that's really quick.

 

Some sort of weird white fungus started growing in their tube, mainly on their feces it would seem.

Was a pain in the donkey to get enough light into their crevice while not covering it up with a reflection.

Edited by LC3, May 28 2018 - 8:39 PM.

[LC3]

[October/08/2018]


Due to some new editions, I've opted to simply place the locale of where the termites were found rather then assigning them a 6 letter abbreviation for names and letters and numbers. Letters for locale. Numbers for colonies.

Zootermopsis angusticollis

Z. angusticollis A1, Metchosin, BC
Colony has remained mostly unchanged, both primary (imagoes) are still present. They've produced 3 soldiers to date with the newest 2 measuring 15mm as opposed to the original 20mm soldier. There's also a couple of individuals that have developed wing buds.

Mature colonies like this one attack hardwood readily compared to incipient colonies which are heavily reliant on soft wood, namely pine. Although they appear to treat it more as a nesting medium.

Z. angusticollis B1, Richmond, BC
I moved this colony out of their test tube on September 30th, by this point they've ceased egg production. I estimate around 50-90 individuals within the colony at this point, no larvae, two soldiers (10 and 15mm in length), and two imagoes (founding pair).

September 30th, 2018

The Z. angusticollis colonies in my possession form these chambers akin to a home base, as in most of the residents, reproductives and at least half of the soldiers seem to reside. This colony has made it between these two slabs of wood, despite the times I've removed the top piece they keep coming back. It is the same with my other colony, theirs is in between two pieces of hardwood where the larvae reside. In the wild I'd imagine this is what Zootermopsis does with the heartwood of a tree.

October 7th

Zootermopsis nevadensis nuttingi

Zootermopsis nevadensis A1 Richmond: Dyke, BC

This colony gradually got worse in health overtime, the only worker they had was eaten and eventually I transferred them out into a container. I left them in the container for probably around 3 months or so. During this time they laid a batch of the typical 20 eggs, about 10 larvae hatched out of this batch.

Unfortunately they've started cannibalizing each other at this point, with all the imagoes having small sections of their thorax or legs bitten off. I decided to transfer them into a test tube built similarly to Nare's since I didn't have high hopes for them and I was wondering if they would do better in such a setup. It was toilet paper mushed together into a test tube. I injured 2 larvae, 8 and 3 eggs made it through. This setup didn't work very well as it flooded sparing only 2 larvae and the 3 imagoes. I believe they did cannibalize some of the larvae whilst in this setup though.

Z. n. nuttingi A2 Richmond: Dyke, BC

On September 28, after taking a detour from my normal route from school to home as luck would have it I stumbled into the middle of a termite flight at the dyke. Probably 6 or so km from the location of the termites found last year.

I am fairly certain that these alates are all siblings as there were no alates to be found outside a few meters section of the trail, furthermore most of the alates seemed to be coming from a patch of grass beside a large long log. The log was firmly stuck in place so chances were high that termites had occupied it, if it was movable chances are it would have been occupied by Myrmica incompleta ants.

September 30th

Z. n. nuttingi B1 Richmond: Shady Island, BC

There's an island that is located off the southern coast of Richmond, what originally started out as a small sandbar through manmade events had expanded into an island in the past century. Although the island was practically created by people it has remained untouched and only accessible by a landbridge at low tide which starts to expose itself at around 6-5ft. The vegetation is overgrown and it appears the only way to access the side opposite to the harbour is through a single path. The side opposite of the harbour has the characteristics of the wetland environment of the dyke. I ended up finding a pair of Zootermopsis termites under a log (although not having made a chamber or showing signs of digging into the log, which leads me to believe the log was unsuitable for the termites).

Compared to the ones found at the dyke these were noticeably lighter in colour, especially the head which was lighter in colour than the body.

Setups:

The collected termites were kept in a container along with some wood from the the mainland coast near Shady Island, half of the alates have retained their wings at this point and they will for the following days as I wait for them to pair up.

They didn't and kept trying to fly out of the container at the slightest source of light (it was chaos). I went and gathered decayed pine wood from the same locale as the wood used for my Z. angusticollis B1 during their founding. I left one larger piece of wood in another container and moved them to that container. They ended up settling and burrowing into it overnight and I haven't counted them yet .

September 30th, 2018. 2 hole end (top) and 3 hole end (bottom) of stick

2 pairs (Pairs A & B ) bored into one end and the rest aggregated onto the other end. I didn't bother to count them prior as they were adamant on flying to any light source. I ended up removing the ones that aggregated and dug out 2 pairs from the wood (determined by being burrowed deepest into the wood), annoyingly these termites tended to form threesoms. Another tunnel was dug but it contained no termites.

I estimate around 14 - 16 termites were collected. The setups consisted of moist cotton at the very back of the tube, damp pine decaying pine wood, and a cotton plug which was replaced with a cork plug once the condensation evaporated. All 2 pairs, the pair from Shady island (Pair S) and Z. nevadensis A1 were put into their own setup on September 30th.

September 30th, 2018. Pair S top, Pair C centre, Pair D bottom

Pair C & D

The Pair S and Pair C got to work quickly, burrowing into the wood within the first few days. Pair D started off iffy and by October 4th the male had stopped moving with the female frantically trying to break out of the cotton. I removed the male cleaned out the tube, although I didn't change the wood, I introduced another male. No problems have arisen yet.

October 1st, 2018. Z. nevadensis A1, Pair S, Pair D, Pair C

As of currently Pair S, and Pair D have made chambers, Pair S more so than Pair D. Pair C has made a series of caverns. Z. nevadensis A1 has not built anything.

October 7th, Z. nevadensis A1.

Pair C

Pair D

Pair S

The remaining 4 (possibly 5?) termites were thrown into a container with miscellaneous pieces of wood, 2 paired up and formed burrowed into a pine stick, another pair had built a chamber from the old remains of the Z. angusticollis A2. Although by October 4th there was one termite wandering around and two days later and no termites were to be seen. The entrance to the pine stick had been plugged (Pair E)

October 4th, 2018. Second pic features the lone imago, third pic is the pair that set up shop under the remnants of the other colony

October 6th

As of October 6th, one of the holes made by Pairs A & B have been plugged.

October 7th, 2018

Edited by LC3, October 8 2018 - 12:12 PM.

[LC3]

Follow up to the post above. Nitrogen is a crucial yet not easily obtainable substance when it comes to termites, it's of such importance that some (or many, I don't know the figures) higher termites have evolved to fix nitrogen at high rates. Zootermopsis are also capable of fixing nitrogen, it's noted that the process however is very slow (along with Cryptotermes and Reticulitermes). Although this shouldn't be a problem for mature colonies, it's a make or break thing for founding reproductives to the point where alates carry stores of uric acid with them (which is the compound Zootermopsis uses as a nitrogen storage). Even so Zootermopsis must feed off of wood in order to lay their first batch of eggs. The more decayed the wood, the higher concentration of nitrogen present. Zootermopsis apparently targets recently fallen trees however probably to avoid competing with established colonies.

When nitrogen is low, males carry out most of the labour, including digging and chewing up wood while the females do nothing. If nitrogen is not a concern then the females do most of the pulp gathering whilst males gather water, the male also transfers his reserves along with other nutrients to the female in the form of fecal pellets. The nitrogen is required for egg laying, once the eggs are laid the imagoes focus on raising the larvae. The lack of nitrogen also leads to cannibalism for Zootermopsis. Affter the first larvae hatch the specialization in labour ceases and both parents spend an equal amount of time and energy caring for the larvae. Adding nitrogen supplements apparently increases the developmental rate and fecundity of neotenics but does not affect imagoes. This also results in the termites having less body weight probably due to needing to eat less in order to obtain nitrogen.

This would explain why Z. angusticollis B1 kept laying eggs continuously even while the first larvae hatched since they've just consumed fungus and killed 9 other termites. Although I suspect initial low egg count for Z. nevadensis A1 was space constraints, once they were moved into the tube they've seem to have avoided the wood, and opted to eat the cotton instead. I would imagine that cotton is rather poor in nitrogen, and thus leading them to cannibalize their only worker. They were probably also starved of nitrogen after laying the batch of eggs in the container prompting them to try and eat each other (since there were 3 there might have been a competition without a clear victor). It is also why I've decided to not even bother to experiment with a paper/cotton based setup for these Zootermopsis.

The fuzzy white fungus from Z. angusticollis B1 seems to be associated with the pine wood as more or something very similar has started growing over the pine wood for these setups. Still unclear to the biology of this fungus although I wonder if it's possible to culture.

Edited by LC3, October 8 2018 - 12:15 PM.

[Nare]

Any signs of Reticulitermes? As well, are there any products that contain uric acid? I believe that all of the products I'd seen when searching for uric acid were supplements to reduce it, not provide it. Also, it's a shame that the termites you tried in toilet paper drowned. I don't suspect  that they'd have thrived anyways - Reticulitermes and many Rhinotermitidae seem to be particularly hardy termites, although perhaps the reason mine seem to be doing well in such a setup is because they are all parts of a mature colony. As you've noted, founding seems to be a delicate phase for these creatures.