What are flying termites?

Occasionally, if you happen to live in areas where the climate is a little warm, you will see lots of flying insects with long wings that swarm around lights at night. These flying insects are often ants or moths, but sometimes you get a big swarm of flying termites. There are many misconceptions about these flying termites, so I’ll try to address them below.

First of all, these flying termites are called alates in proper scientific terms. They are not aggressive at all and do not attack anyone or anything. The reason they swarm is because they are on a mating flight. You see termite colonies only produce flying termites on a seasonal basis for the purpose of reproduction.

If you do not know what termites are, here is a very clear depiction of what do termites look like, which differs from that of ants. Simple termite identification is enough to differentiate termites from ants. Now, these flying termites are not the normal castes of workers or soldiers, but they are future kings and queens whose purpose is to mate and start new termite colonies. Workers and soldiers cannot start new colonies because they are sterile.

Flying termites often swarm at night, and lights serve as meeting places for the opposite sexes to find each other, so to speak. So that is why, these flying termites swarm around lights at night. Not all species swarm at night though; some termite species swarm during the day after or during light rain. Swarming seasons can be several times a year, or just once a year, depending on species.

Flying termites are eaten by a large variety of predators like lizards, birds, and ants, because they are loaded with fat stores designed to last them for months without having to eat. So this makes them a nutritious meal, even for humans, in some parts of the world like Africa. There, the termites are dried and roasted as a snack.

Some people think flying termites can fight with ants, but again, that is a huge misconception. Yet, you see videos on YouTube purportedly showing flying termites versus ants. All these videos show are termites getting slaughtered by ants. The truth is, ants are a much more aggressive insect than termites will ever be, even for termite soldiers, and no, flying termites do not fight.

Flying termites are no more than a nuisance, and if you are bothered by a large swarm, placing a bowl of water underneath your lights will quickly catch a lot of them. They should just be viewed in the same vein as flying ants, both of which are flying reproductive males and females whose purpose is to start new colonies.