Termites
Published by timbomb December 13th, 2006 in Miscellaneous
There’s a lot going on right now. Exactly the kinds of things I should be blogging about. But I’m too busy doing to reflect. Instead, let me tell you about the guy who just left my house.
A few weeks ago, I heard a tiny knocking noise in the bannister of our internal stairs. I investigated and discovered termites burrowing beneath the paint. When I pushed through the paint they came spilling out. I surface-sprayed them into submission.
Over the next few weeks I kept hearing them in different parts of the house. We told the landlord, but they didn’t get around to sending anyone.
Then when the weather turned hot one afternoon, from the front of the house in our bedroom, thousands of flying ants kind of exploded out of the wall and floor, many of them flying into our bedroom, most out onto the street. Anthony was home alone and had to spend an hour or so running around with a vacuum cleaner trying to catch them all.
It’s been a bit like living in the Amityville house… 
So, today the landlord finally sent us an exterminator. He tells me a few things:
- That knocking noise is the soldiers tapping to keep the workers in line. It’s a signal. Drives me nuts.
- Don’t ever use surface spray when you find them, it scares the termites off and makes the exterminator’s job much harder.
- That day our bedroom exploded in flying ants wasn’t just us - when the conditions are right, all the nests release them. It’s called Flying Ant Day.
- The brown goo I found behind the paint when I pushed through was mud - pulled up for nesting works by the little monsters.
Most educational exterminator visit ever!
This is exactly the sort of entomological abuse that the Australasian Society for the Preservation of the White Ant etc. has been formed to eradicate. In our overly urbanised society, we have sought to marginalise this maligned creature to the tightly constrained environment of party political processes. While these ordure rich environments do provide marvelous nutritional support for our little friends, the elevated air temperatures and gusty conditions which prevail usually prevent them realising their true potential and manifest destinies as happy, productive individuals immersed in the “we” of the hive.
It is only within treated wooden environments, like Tim’s banister and front porch, that their real glory begins to emerge shyly (or not) into the light of day. I say we should protect these little darlings at all costs as they are unarguably an Australian icon, individually and en masse, of at least equal stature with the very delicious Wollemi Pine.
Yours in Deep Concern Simon