INDIAN WOOD-DESTROYING WRITE ANTS. 691 



wood-destroyers ; but if it is a matter of Termites doing damage in 

 any kind of building they are certain, according to my experience, to 

 belong to one of the just mentioned genera. 



This showed itself most strikingly in the case of Odontotermes 

 Fece in Ohota Nagpur, where this species abounds. I examined 

 dozens of its nests in garden, field and forest, and in every case — I do 

 not remember a single exception — I found colonies of Microtermes 

 associated with it. But in buildings such a companionship was 

 never noticed ; there Odontotermes Fece held the field alone in the 

 beams of walls as well as in the rafters of roofs. 



I add a few of the more important localities where I took speci- 

 mens of the wood-destroyers under discussion : Leucotermes found 

 in Calcutta, Mangalore, and in villages of South Canara near the 

 range of the Western Ghats ; Goptotermes in Calcutta, Mangalore, 

 and Ranchi ; Odontotermes Fece in the lastnamed places, and also 

 in the Ghats of South Canara up to an elevation of 3-4,000 feet. 



To sum up : of the various kinds of wood-destroying Termites 

 in India only three appear to have adapted themselves to live in 

 buildings^ and feed on wood contained in them ; these three occur 

 almost everywhere throughout the Peninsula. This is of special 

 interest, because on the one hand our wood-eating species are on the 

 whole fairly numerous, and on the other the respective Termite 

 Faunas of Northern, Central and Southern India exhibit consider- 

 able variety. 



Special mention must here be made of Sind, for I am not quite 

 sure whether the above statement is applicable to this Province as 

 well. Of the many specimens taken in buildings and otherwise I 

 have received from Sind, none belonged to either Leucotermes or 

 Odontotermes Fece. Goptotermes was taken in different places, 

 but the kind most often sent to me was Microtermes. It would 

 therefore seem that the two firstnamed forms are not represented 

 in Sind, whereas the last genus is far more often met with than in 

 other parts of India, and has even acqu.ired the habit of attacking 

 timber in houses. But details are as yet too scanty to allow of any 

 definite opinion on this head. I hope to settle the matter as soon 

 as I get a chance of visiting Sind at some future time. 



The peculiar custom of Microtermes of living associated with 

 other Termites has already been mentioned. I often found Micro- 

 termes colonies in the mounds of Odontotermes ohesus, in the nest 

 area of Odontotermes Fece, etc. With regard to the latter " com- 

 pound nests," I came always to the conclusion — after careful 

 examination of the feeding figures and fillings — that the attack on 

 wood on which the Termites were seen feeding, had been started by 



^ Cp. the similar habit of the tme Ants Prenolcpis longicornis (Aitken, 

 T> ihes on my Frontier, p. 51 ; Wroughton, this Journal Vol. vii., p. 41), and 

 Plagiolojais longipes (y^vovughiou, 1. c. p. 385), 



