TERMITES
a dead stump or a log, you are more than likely to find it tunneled all through with small tubular galleries running with the grain of the wood, but everywhere connected crosswise by small openings or short passages. Within the exposed galleries there will be seen numerous small, pale, wingless insects running here and there in an effort to conceal themselves. These insects are termites. They are the miners or the descendants of miners that have excavated the tunnels in which they live. Not all of the galleries in the nest are open runways, many of them being packed solidly with small pellets of refuse.
If the termites confined themselves to useless wood, they would be known only as interesting insects; but since they often extend the[r operations into fence posts, telegraph poles, the woodwork of houses, and even into furniture, they have placed themselves among the destructive insects and have acquired an important place in the pages of economic entomology. Stored papers, books, cloth, and leather are not exempt from their attack. In the United States it not infrequently happens that the flooring or other wooden parts of buildings must be replaced, owing to the unsuspected work of termites; and piled lumber is especially liable to invasion by these insidious insects. But in tropical countries the termites are far more numerous than in temperate regions, and are vastly more destructive than they are with us. Their seclusive habits make the termites a particularly vexatious pest, because they have usually accomplished an irreparable amount of damage before their presence is known or suspected. The economic entomologist studying termites gives most of his attention, therefore, to devising methods of preventing the access of the insects to all wooden structures that they might destroy.
The work of termites and the ways and means that have been contrived to prevent their ravages have been described in many agricultural publications, and the reader whose tastes are purely practical is referred to
[129]
