With the ongoing rains, you might have witnessed some flying termites.
If not so, you are yet to see them.
During the rainy season, it is common to see flying termites after rainfall.
Why do you think they fly out of the ground during the raining season?
These termites are also known as alates.
Their job is to depart from the nest, find a mate and establish a new termite colony — one that might eventually be home to thousands of offspring.
The swarm mostly occurs after heavy rainfall or warm, humid temperatures.
Post-flight, the fertilized termites shed their wings and establish colonies of their own.
Colonies can be a few miles wide, running below entire neighborhoods.
Also, rain helps make the ground wetter, which in turn improves the chances of termites survival since there is plenty of water available.
However, the rain is not the trigger for swarming so much as warm temperatures, humidity and the age of the colony itself.
These swarmers don’t fly very well and usually travel no more than about 100 meters from their original colony.
In reality, very few of the swarmers who fly each year mate and establish new colonies, and very few of the new colonies ever reach maturity, which can take years.
Yet, if they survive, the swarmers can be surprisingly long-lived.
A termite queen can live to be more than 30 years old.
Have you tasted these insects used as a delicacy by some tribes in Kenya?
Let us know your experience in the comment section.