Several hundred species are economically significant as pests that can cause serious damage to buildings, crops or plantation forests. Termites are a delicacy in the diet of some human cultures and are used in many traditional medicines. Colonies are described as super organisms because the termites form part of a self-regulating entity: the colony itself. Unlike ants, which undergo a complete metamorphosis, each individual termite goes through an incomplete metamorphosis that proceeds through egg, nymph and adult stages. Termite queens have the longest lifespan of any insect in the world, with some queens living up to 50 years. Their colonies range in size from a couple of hundred individuals to enormous societies with several million individuals. Termites are among the most successful groups of insects on Earth, colonizing most landmasses except for Antarctica. Termites are major detritivores, particularly in the subtropical and tropical regions, and their recycling of wood and plant matter is of considerable ecological importance. Termites mostly feed on dead plant material and cellulose, generally in the form of wood, leaf litter, soil, or animal dung. All colonies have fertile males called “kings” and one or more fertile females called “queens”. Like ants and some bees and wasps from the separate order Hymenoptera, termites divide labour among castes consisting of sterile male and female “workers” and “soldiers”. Although these insects are often called white ants, they are not ants. Approximately 3,106 species are currently described, with a few hundred more left to be described. It is possible, however, that the first termites emerged during the Permian or even the Carboniferous. ![]() Termites were once classified in a separate order from cockroaches, but recent phylogenetic studies indicate that they evolved from close ancestors of cockroaches during the Jurassic or Triassic. Termites are eusocial insects that are classified at the taxonomic rank of infraorderIsoptera, or as epifamily Termitoidae within the cockroach order Blattodea.
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