Yellow-footed soil termites
| Yellow-footed soil termites | ||||||||||||
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Yellow-footed ground termite soldiers |
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| Reticulitermes flavipes | ||||||||||||
| ( Kollar , 1837) |
The eastern subterranean termite ( Reticulitermes flavipes ) is a termite art from the family of Rhinotermitidae . It becomes four to five millimeters long and destroys built-in wood.
Colonies
Yellow-footed soil termite colonies can contain 20,000 to 5 million workers, on average 300,000. They are created in the ground below the frost line. Secondary nests can also lie above the ground. However, these must be in contact with a source of moisture such as a leak in a water pipe. Protective tubes are often placed between the colony and the food sources.
distribution
The yellow-footed soil termite occurs in eastern North America and north to Ontario , Canada and south to Key Largo in Florida . It was brought into wood from North America by ship to Germany. It was first detected in Hamburg in 1937 and in Munich in 1966 .
food
The yellow-footed soil termite can use all materials that consist of cellulose as food, i.e. wood, paper and cotton . Sometimes it eats the roots of trees and bushes.
The hypermastigotic flagellates Spirotrichonympha sp. and Trichonympha sp. live exclusively in this type of termite. They split the cellulose and make it usable for the termite.
Individual evidence
- ↑ Fact Sheet Eastern Subterranean Termite / BASF (PDF).
- ↑ Hans Schmidt: Observations on the introduced yellow-footed soil termite (Reticulitermes flavipes Kollar) . In: Insectes Sociaux . tape 15 , no. 3 . Birkhäuser, September 1968, ISSN 0020-1812 , p. 319-322 , doi : 10.1007 / BF02225854 .
- ↑ Renate Radek and Klaus Hausmann: Symbiotic flagellates in termites. In: Institute for Scientific Film (Hrsg.): Publications on scientific films . 1994, ISSN 0073-8417 , p. 153–173 , doi : 10.3203 / IWF / C-1790 (film C 1790, material accompanying the film ).
literature
- W. Westheide, R. Rieger: Special Zoology. Part 1. Protozoa and invertebrates. Gustav Fischer Verlag, Stuttgart / Jena / New York 1996, ISBN 3-437-20515-3 .
