116 ARKIV FÖR ZOOLOGI. BAND 12. N:0 15. 



Tbe only two arboreal nests I have met within Australia 

 are built by Eutermes fumipennis Walk. and by Hamitermes 

 Cheeli Mjöb. which latter species, however, also builds typical 

 black, conical ground-nests of a form and sbape very much 

 resembling the nest of Microcerotermes excisus Mjöb. In 

 the Cape York Peninsula I observed that many smaller trees 

 in the open savannah forest were covered at tbe eastern 

 side witli, more or less broad, reddisb ducts, wbich sometimes 

 were so wide as to cover the whole eastern half of the 

 tree. In the galleries underneath there were thousands of 

 workers and soldiers of Bhinotermes intermedius running up 

 and down. No sign of any nest-like formation could, however, 

 be discovered. Apparently the galleries were built up under 

 the fairly brittle cover in order to protect the workers in 

 their harvesting of useful products from the higher parts of 

 the tree. The real nest of the two Australian Bhinotermes 

 species is always built under the ground or under stones, 

 logs etc. 



The reason, why the two above-mentioned species build 

 arboreal nests is very likely in order to escape floods. In many 

 localities the ground is very swampy and gets quite flooded 

 after an exceptionally heavy rainfall. This would certainly 

 prove very disastrous for the nest, which in both species 

 is of a very light and brittle construction. To secure the 

 young offspring and the valuable queen, or queens, the nests 

 have been placed higher and higher up on the trunk. Miro- 

 termes Cheeli Mjöb. builds its nest so far as I have observed 

 only about one meter above the ground, Eutermes fumi- 

 pennis Walk. at a height of even 40 metres. 



One of the most interesting fields for studying the ter- 

 mite life and especially the different nests in Austraha is 

 the northern part of Queensland. In many places in the 

 interiör parts of Cape York Peninsula the ground is literally 

 covered with nests of tbe most variable types. In tbe vici- 

 nity of Laura I could count in less than five minutes up to 

 six different nests. These were the following: (1) the very tall 

 greyish s>magnetic» nests of Hamitermes meridionalis Feogg. 

 standing as close to each other as the tombstones on a 

 graveyard (Plate 6, Fig. 2), (2) the very broad conical, heavy 

 nests of Eutermes Tyriei Mjöb. (Pl. 3, Fig. 1), (3) the flat, 

 cake-like, solid nests of Hamitermes perniger Frogg., lying on 



