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flaky footage depict termites locked in a " decease spiral " — where they walk round and round in a circle following the louse onwards until they become flat from exhaustion .
In the time , uploaded by Simon Jeffery to the Australia & New Zealand Fungus Identification chemical group onFacebook , the termites follow each other in a ring . The phenomenon has been observed in some colonies of socialinsects , such as termites and , more ordinarily , ants(Formicidae ) .
The video was shot at a woodworking show. It’s unclear how the termites ended up inside the fungus.
The footage was charm in Maleny in Queensland , Australia , about five years ago , Jeffery told Live Science in a message on social medium . He was at a woodworking show and a man at one stall was give a talk about the roles fungi and insects play in the ecosystem .
" [ He had ] all different types of bark and all sorts of critters that break down the woods … It was a very cool stall , " Jeffery said , adding he is not sure if the sales booth owner put the termites in the fungus .
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track - following behavior in termites is controlled by specific pheromone that are produced by the abdominal sternal gland . They deposit these pheromone so nestmates can find the path back to the nest .
Thomas Chouvenc , assistant prof of urban bugology at the Fort Lauderdale Research and Education Center at the University of Florida , told Live Science that trail - following enable white ant to navigate blindly around their home ground . However , this mode of navigating the world can sometimes go wrong .
" In this television , they are engaged in a ' death spiral , ' which is well document in pismire and a few white ant , " he tell . " When a group of foraging social insect get accidentally caught into a death spiral , they usually terminate up dying of enfeeblement , " he add together .
" For white ant , the physical contact of following a herald in the waiting line is often a mere elbow room to organize in force dealings flow , " he said . " Such seam are very common in termites , leading them from A to B. In the font of this video , that line made a loop because of the physical roofy from the sound structure of the fungi . "
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Researchershave investigated a like phenomenon in army ants . Occasionally , a settlement of pismire will form an " ant James Mill . " If some emmet become separated from the main foraging colony — for example , because of a feature of speech of the terrain — they may lose the pheromone trail and begin to follow one another , work a rotating circle until they die .
However , Chouvenc said he is shy how the termite ended up on the fungus . " What stupefy me here is : How in the heck did the termite terminate up here ? Termites arecryptic — intend that they do n’t come out into the open — so they should not naturally be expose to the elements like this , unless they masticate through the fungus from the interior and accumulated over time , and ended up being mystify in this circular structure . "
Chouvenc added that someone may have placed the termites on the fungus . " disregarding , this is unusual , to say the least , " he say .
