Across the dense forest and prairies of Asia and Africa, there exist a talented and secret society of Architects, who can build and construct a sophisticated and eco friendly home for themselves. But they never comes out to share the innovative designs with others.
We are referring to the colony of Termites A Termite is small ant like species that can slowly chew upon the wooden material.
Termite, often considered as wood destroyer, which can eat and digest wood cellulose and slowly degrade wooden life. Be it Bed, Sofa or any furniture made up of wood. May be that is why Termites were often referred as Silent Destroyer / Silent Invador.
However there are some hidden quality of these small insects too, which make them a good architect and builder. A Termite Mound or Termite Nest is great symbol of architectural beauty by these small species. And i found one at the jungle entrance.
Termite, were considered to be living in a colony in large number just like beehive, they make these mounds above the ground to protect themselves from different weather condition. They require acceptable level of temperature, moisture and gases to survive.
Means when they are not busy in destroying anything, they live in these self made castle of their own. I found these small bunch of mounds during my morning walk.
Our local village people also considered these mounds/ nest as Snake Home. Many snakes like to feed upon these small insects , and get inside the castle while searching for their food.
But this one particular looks quite packed and air tight from all angles to be in any kind of snake risk.
How they made such cones??
These mounds were carefully made by the Termites. Their Architecture is usually in cone shape and built in such way that there is sufficient air circulation all the time. We can find the structure in resemblance with man made Pyramid where there is enough effort made for proper air circulation.
These mounds were generally made up of Termite saliva, Termite feces, and Clay
A termite will grab one soil particle, mix it with water and saliva and cement it in place. The next termite will come along and put their soil blob down next to the one previous, and this continues until eventually a wall is built. However, soon there are too many termites walking around with soil blobs, and this results in a termite traffic jam
Source
Termite being themselves the architect with their small figure can make such mounds upto 9 Meter above ground level in various part of Australia and America, however in shady forest areas they can build these small castles not much in height. But they make many small one in groups.
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But why they need to make such nest/ mounds??
The question is quite obvious and must be coming in everyone's mind. As these small tiny insects can easily stick to any wood material and can live upon. Especially in jungle which has many trees all around.
After decades of studies, it was found that Termite do not live in their mounds /nest. They just make them which can home thousands of other individuals below the grounds. These small termite may walk into these mounds only to repair or protect them from invading by Ants.
Many other scientist and biologist believe that these Termite generally does Fungus farming through these mounds/nest. This is basically a mutual beneficial understanding between the two.
The Fungus helps in destroying the food material and makes them easily digestible for Termite. There are lot of hustle and bustle goes within the mound which is not easily visible through naked eye. There are lot of science involved too in making these Termite Castles
While building these mounds , these small insects gives due consideration of inside moisture level and outside temperature. The mounds absorbs the day heat, however keep the inside cool. Also large amount of carbon dioxide released from within the mounds to maintain inner temperature.
The mechanism to built such natural tower is quite magnificent, and I wonder if humans understand the science then it not too far that we start living in eco-friendlier sphere which helps in protecting our environment.
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