ARBOREAL TERMITE NESTS

Out in the scrub you see brown, basketball-size termite nests on tree branches, like the one shown below:

Termites in such nests find most of the damp wood they consume on the forest floor. Since termites are plump, slow-moving insects bearing no stingers or particularly powerful pincers, the question arises as to how they commute between their arboreal home and the forest floor without getting picked off by predators. The answer is that they build covered pathways between their nests and the forest floor, such as those shown snaking down a tree's trunk below:

These covered highways tend to be placed on a branch's lower and/or shaded side. Such placement would keep tropical sunlight from heating things up too much inside the tunnel, plus the tunnels would be more protected from rain.

A close-up of a tunnel, showing how it appears to be made of glued-together sawdust particles, is below:

If you'd like to see inside an arboreal termite nest, meet various members of a termite caste system, and read about defensive and aggressive behaviors, go to http://www.kbinirsnb.be/cb/ants/information/termites_arboreal.HTM.