322 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1911. 
The fact that the white ants live and work entirely under cover 
might naturally lead one to infer that they were much less abundant 
than the true ants. But nowhere have I found the ground as thickly 
covered with the termites’ nests as with those of the true ants, a fact 
probably due to some extent to the methods by which the two kinds 
of insects procure their food supplies. 
I have never been able to estimate the number of individuals in 
the old colonies, nor have I found such an estimate made by any- 
one else. In the matter of numbers we are obliged to depend on 
general impressions gained from the abundance of the above-ground 
structures of the separate colonies and from certain of their habits. 
For example, it is stated that the queen of an allied species whose 
habits have been studied has ‘‘an egg-laying rate of 60 per mintute, or 
something like 80,000 per day.” ! 
ANIMALS FEEDING ON TERMITES. 
As the white ants have no means of defense against their natural 
enemies, they are easily destroyed and are preyed on by many other 
insectivorous animals. Indeed, one of the impressive evidences 
of the great numbers of the white ants in South America is the 
existence there of certain large vertebrate burrowing animals that 
are said to feed almost exclusively upon the white ants.? 
The great ant-eater, known in Brazil as the tamandud bandeira, is 
said to live entirely on ants. Brazilians acquainted with the habits 
of the tamandud tell me, however, that the ant-eater does not eat the 
satibas or other biting or stinging ants, but that it lives chiefly and 
almost exclusively on the cupim, or so-called white ant. To give an 
idea of the size of the animal, I quote the following measurements 
of an ant-eater as given by Wells: Head, 16 inches; back, 4 feet; 
tail, 4 feet; total length, 9 feet 4 inches.’ 
The existence of an animal as big as an ordinary dog, over 2 feet 
high at the shoulder, with its long, slender muzzle, its powerful 
forelegs and claws adapted to the excavation and exploration of 
ant-mounds, and its tongue nearly a yard in length, and living 
chiefly, if not entirely, upon white ants, is an important witness 
on the side of the abundance of termites in the region in which it 
lives. Bates reports four species of ant-eaters in the Amazonas 
region, two of which are large and two small ones (op. cit., 2d ed., 
p. 110), while Wallace says there are five species in tropical America, 
besides one extinct form. 
1C. L. Marlatt: Circular 50, p. 3, 2d ser., Bureau of Entomology, U. S. Department of Agriculture. 
Washington, 1908. 
2 Holes often found in the mounds of the true ants show that some of these large ant-eating animals feed 
on the true ants also. 
3J. W. Wells: Three thousand miles through Brazil, vol. 2, p. 141. London, 1886. 
4A. R. Wallace: The geographical distribution of animals, vol. 2, p. 247. New York, 1876. _ 
