What are termites?
Termites, most commonly subterranean termites, are social insects that live in colonies within the ground. The termite colony has 3 castes: workers, soldiers, and reproductives. Termites help the environment by consuming dead wood. During late winter or early spring, winged termites (swarmers), which are attracted to light, emerge from the ground and swarm to find mates to start a new colony. Swarmers are not harmful to wood but if they succeed to form a colony, the workers born from the colony will feed on wood and can cause severe structural damage. The king and queen in a colony can live for 10 to 30 years, while workers live for about 2 years.
Termites mostly feed on dead plant material, generally in the form of wood, leaf litter, soil, or animal dung, and about 10 percent of the estimated 4,000 species (about 2,600 taxonomically known) are economically significant as pests that can cause serious structural damage to buildings, crops or plantation forests.