Video: Turbo termites team up to form swarm
IT SOUNDS like a low-budget B-movie, but the two most destructive termite species have interbred to form a super-race.
The Formosan and Asian subterranean termites, native to east Asia, are now widespread invasive species, causing billions of dollars of damage annually. Their ranges rarely overlap, and where they do 鈥� such as in southern Florida 鈥� they have bred at different times of year.
But at the University of Florida in Fort Lauderdale noticed that breeding swarms had begun to form at the same time, with many cross-species pairs. What鈥檚 more, these mixed pairs founded viable colonies in the lab 鈥� and churned out offspring twice as fast as the parent species (PLOS One, ).
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鈥淚f it grows that fast, it can make damage that much faster, too,鈥� says Chouvenc.
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淭urbo termites threaten Florida鈥�
