Drywood termites: the most dangerous to humans (8 photos)

For us, residents of the northern and temperate regions of the planet, termites are those cool, social relatives of cockroaches that build clay pillars the height of a giraffe. But for those living in the southern regions, termites are a nasty pest that will devour a wooden house without even choking. And the most dangerous of them are the drywood termites.





As you might have guessed from the name, drywood termites prefer dry wood to any other kind; in their eyes, people literally build houses out of premium food. That's why termites flock to them like schoolchildren to hotcakes! Many termites don't mind snacking on a couple of ceiling beams, but most build underground nests and need a nearby water source to wash down their not-so-edible food. Our heroes, however, don't need all that. They settle right into the dry wood and begin carving nesting chambers, simultaneously eating and processing cellulose.



You rip off a chair leg like this, and inside is this.

Locating such a colony is not easy. Unlike normal termites, drywood termites don't protrude beyond the wood they've chosen and don't destroy its surface. The only telltale signs are a few small holes and a pile of brown powder underneath—the insects' waste products. These signs are easy to miss, so many unfortunates only notice a drywood termite infestation when the wooden chair they're sitting on suddenly breaks, sending swarms of tiny insects scurrying out. And a chair isn't the smallest object they can infest.





This is what happens to a beam infested with these insects.

There are 420 species of drywood termites worldwide, varying greatly in size. The largest can reach 2 centimeters in length, while the smallest are less than 3 millimeters. The latter are the most dangerous. These termites burrow not only into the walls and floors of a house, but also into any wooden furniture, including chairs, cabinets, nightstand doors, and picture frames. Therefore, they can even inhabit apartments in concrete and brick buildings.



When I ordered designer furniture, this isn't what I had in mind...



On the other hand, you could open an automated production facility for abstract art pieces.

And as if that weren't enough, the life of the owner of an infested home is further complicated by the very structure of the termite mound. Unlike ants and the more familiar termites, drywood termites don't have a separate caste of worker insects. Their place is taken by pseudoworkers—immature males and females who can grow into sterile soldiers or become fertile founders of a new colony.



Soldier below, pseudoworker above.

At first glance, this changes nothing, but only at first. In most other social insects, the death of the queen either leads to the complete destruction of the nest or significantly hinders its development—after all, the workers have to spend a tremendous amount of time finding a replacement. These fellows, however, have thousands of candidates right inside the nest for the deceased queen. A replacement will be made almost instantly.



Girls, there's a vacancy! Who will be the next queen?

Even the complete dispersal of the colony with the physical destruction of its nest is no guarantee of victory. After all, every worker is a potential founder of a new colony, which can be founded literally half a meter from the site of the previous colony's demise. And no one will protect you from reinfestation—mature termites can fly.



Termite treatment is in full swing.

So how do you combat this ubiquitous threat? There's only one way: throw out all suspicious wooden objects (even if they're treasured memories) and douse your home with insecticides. Modern insecticides are typically applied using cold fog generators. The water mist penetrates even the tiniest passages and kills the insects in their nests. Only then, after a couple of treatments, can you breathe a sigh of relief, confident that your bed won't collapse while you sleep.