A lone termite alate scrambles across the alien surface amidst the chaos of wings,
panic, and the gnashing mandibles of the ants wanting to kill them. Where should she turn?
Where had her husband termite gone? She had no choice but to keep running.
All around her termites were being murdered one by one, termite bodies falling in from everywhere,
woah, she almost got caught. She dashed away from the struggling termite whose fate was sealed. Her
only shot at survival was to seek refuge and hide under a clump of moss. Under such cover, the ants
would likely not be able to find her, amidst this all out war that has broken out on this night.
The noxious stench of mating pheromones and the blood of the frantic termite royals,
along with the burning formic acid that was sprayed mercilessly on them
by the ferocious spiny ant colony, filled the air and reeked of death throughout all of Polyrhaxia.
I watched wide-eyed as the spiny ants pounced and tore into every termite king and queen
that had unluckily fallen into the ants’ territory, and couldn’t get out.
Many of these termite kings and queens would never go on to be monarchs of their own termite
colonies, but instead will be meat for an eager and hungry colony of spiny ants. But,
in this bloody war of nature between ants and termites, one might assume that the ants obviously
win and the poor termites inevitably lose? Well, not so fast. Keep on watching to find out the
true winners of this termites vs. ants war of survival. Welcome to the AntsCanada Ant Channel.
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Guys, I've got some sad news: sadly, the two pairs of termite alates that I captured a few weeks ago
that I was hoping to start a termite colony from ended up dying. I kind of expected this and wasn’t
too bummed out by it, because I do know that in the world of termites, unlike in the world
of ants, colony founding success rate is much, much lower, and as you’ll see and learn in a bit,
is all part of the termite success formula in nature. Just a warning, though, guys: Some scenes
in this video may be disturbing to some viewers, so brace yourselves for the ultimate termite
bloodbath that is coming up ahead! I myself was shocked watching the entire event unfold.
So here’s how it all went down.
Earlier this week, I noticed the swarm! A huge termite swarm of millions of virgin queen
and king alates filled the air so numerous that if you opened your mouth long enough,
one would surely fly into it! It was on this night that this particular species of fairly
large termites was having their annual mating nuptial flight, a nationwide event
in which each of the termite kings and queens had waited to partake for their whole lives.
It was on this night that each of these winged termite kings and queens had one vital task:
to select and “marry” their one true love to live and breed with for the rest of their lives,
for years and years, to create termite colonies of their own underground.
And I say “marry” because that’s literally what they do. When a king and queen pair find each
other, they do this sort of ritual which you see here and then suddenly, they engage in a
tandem run of survival, to seek a suitable place underground to create a founding chamber in which
they will lay eggs and start their own colonies. As you will see, a great deal of these alates
fail to make it out alive on these nuptial flight nights, and in fact, the majority will die.
Predators love these nuptial flights because they get to enjoy an utter feast! Spider
webs everywhere get draped with unlucky termite alates. Lizards enjoy the termite alate buffet.
As for me, I love when these termite nuptial flights happen because it’s a chance for my
ant colonies living in open top setups to feast on termite beef limitlessly. I simply fixate lights
over the ant terrariums and the termite kings and queens fall in. As a human, it looks pretty crazy,
but at ground level, from the insects’ perspective the scene is much, much more grim.
Termites were fighting to get across to the other side of the glass to get closer to the light,
not knowing that behind it lay death. The spiny ants of a colony named the Blades of Midas,
danced around the termite bodies they had killed, after falling from the skies.
It was a frantic hunt of catch, seize, and kill
these ants were not really used to. The termites were strong and quick to slip away,
but the ants had jaws and burning formic acid to help immobilize the termites.
This termite here thought it could get away,
but bam. The ants are skilled grapplers. It was truly going to be a buffet for the ants tonight.
Once the ants had a good grip, it was almost impossible to get away,
plus the chances of escape decrease drastically if more than one ant comes in for the kill. Once in a
death hold, the ants sprayed formic acid, and for this termite it was right in the softer exposed
tissue of the neck. The termite struggled for its life in pain, but there would be no escape now.
I couldn’t believe my eyes as the ants picked off the termites one by one.
What was crazy to me seeing all of this, is I usually feed these ants freshly killed
feeder roaches, so these ants have never had to kill moving prey in their life,
but watching them coordinate a full attack like this
was pretty mind blowing. Mind blowing to know that the predatory instincts with which Mother
Nature had equipped them to survive, were still there and ready to be activated at any time.
A part of me feels bad for the termites, but I realize this is a very narrow-minded
and human perspective. Looking at the greater picture, this is very much so, a natural
and necessary process. You see, in the wild, these ants would depend on annual events like
this termite nuptial flight for a surplus of protein, kind of like how a hunting season
would bring a year’s worth of meat for a small hunting village of people. The ants really need
this abundance of meat to bring on an explosion of eggs by their queens, grow their young,
and as we’ve seen in last week’s episode, to spin silk needed to build their enormous debris nests.
These spiny ants are special in that they don’t dig nests in soil like regular ants,
but rather construct web-lined nests of material gathered from their environment. My inclination is
that if we could somehow track the colony growth rate, the egg-laying rate, nest-building rate,
and even the timing for production of new queens and male ants, that they would be
centered around these key protein surplus events, these termite nuptial flights.
I suspect that not only these ants, but a plethora of different animals depend
on the valuable nourishment these termite nuptial flight seasons bring in the ecosystems they occur.
In fact, I suspect that termites are the biggest,
most important feeder insect Mother Nature provides for insectivorous animals. Yes,
ants have nuptial flights, too but ants are skinny and generally not full of nutrition
so most animals leave them alone, but termites are fat little packets of nutrients and these termite
kings and queen alates are pretty much defenseless so they make amazing food for predators.
As mentioned earlier in the video, termites depend on quantity to succeed. Their tactic
is to produce millions upon millions of these virgin queens and kings, more than is possible
for all the other creatures to eat, and you can guarantee that a few will actually survive.
It’s a very resource and nutrient expensive tactic on the termites’ part, because think about
how much food, space, and care you need to create these large reproductive termites, but as you will
find out later, this is all part of the genius that is the termite life cycle and evolution.
What I saw next broke my heart though. AC Family, watch this.
My eyes caught sight of a bonded pair of termites, that had gotten married inside Polyrhaxia. Crazy
to think that despite the threat of beving killed the drive to get married was still
strong and ongoing in the termites. Even with an ant killing its partner, this termite royal was
unwilling to leave. As the saying goes, Termites believe in Death Do Us Part. She was not about
to leave her partner to die. She looked back, almost calling her King to tandem run with her
to safety, which he couldn’t possibly do now. She came to circle him to get him to tandem run
but this was a lethal move. She too fell victim to the ants. They would die together tonight.
Watching these intense scenes happening on a microlevel was difficult, but the more I
stepped back, the easier it was to appreciate the importance of what was going on here.
The termite tactic of numbers became so evident as I scanned the surface of Polyrhaxia. By this
time in the night, there were way more termites than the ants could finish.
Termite wings and bodies littered the floor as ants did their best to catch
up with the never-ending supply of termites that wouldn’t stop falling from the skies.
I caught sight of that lone termite, who weaved her way through the chaos,
coming close to being caught by the ants many times,
but successfully disappearing under some moss where the ants didn’t seem to be able to find her.
I then began to wonder, what if a king and queen married pair in Polyrhaxia did manage to escape
the jaws and acid sprays of the spiny ants? There weren’t enough ants to catch them all.
What if among the droves of unlucky termite casualties,
one lucky pair actually managed to survive in here by getting underground on time?
Once successfully deep in the soil, the termites would be safe from the spiny ants, because as
mentioned these spiny ants don’t dig tunnels to nest underground. Any termites underground
would actually be safe and free to start their own termite colonies. I
began to wonder if there were any termite alate survivors within the soils of Polyrhaxia. Well,
there was only one way to find out, and if a termite mound would one day start to swell up from
the ground in Polyrhaxia, we’ll know our answers as to why and how. Wouldn’t that be something?
And so, the crazy scene we had all seen tonight actually made me realize something
pretty profound, and it’s this: Sure, it’s easy to look at an individual scene and feel bad for
the dying termites, and people might say “Yup, the ants win this war, and the termites lose!”
But when you look at the much bigger picture, that’s not so much the case. Yes,
the ants benefit from these annual feeding events but I realized in a way, the termites themselves
also win, in light of the termite numbers strategy. The more termite alates you can
produce, the more you can be sure that only the truly savvy, that tiny 0.0001
or whatever percent of the strongest termites with the best genes for smarts, agility,
and whatever else helps those surviving termites on this truly dangerous night,
get to go on to pass their genes to the next generation. If you’re not the best, then the
predators pick you off so only the remaining premium bloodline can continue the lineage.
This allows termites as an order of insects, to truly evolve quicker powered by natural selection.
A strategy of numbers is the brilliance of termite biology, and so in a way, these termites also win.
In fact, I realized that all players in this natural war actually win: the ants,
the termites, the spiders, the lizards, and that if you look at the big picture, there really is
no loser in a natural war like this. There is only one true winner: Mother Nature herself.
Thank you so much for watching and supporting the ants, the termites,
and all of Mother Nature’s perfect lifeforms. It’s ant love forever!
…oh yeah, and I forgot to mention that I too, am a winner tonight!
I caught a tonne of termite newlyweds! Future termite colony, here we come! Yeah!