We had 23mm of rain between dawn and breakfast time this morning. It made us very happy – we’ve been waiting for ‘real rain’ for months – and it triggered the emergence of swarms of what we used to call ‘flying ants’.
They are not ants at all but termites. The confusion of common names runs deep – ‘white ants’ are termites too – but termites and ants are not closely related. In fact, termites are closer to cockroaches, and ants to bees, than they are to each other. What they do have in common is a colonial, often subterranean, lifestyle.
Rain after a long dry spell triggers the emergence of swarms of winged (‘alate’) mating adults. If they are very lucky, they will meet and breed with adults from nearby colonies and set up new homes underground. More often, they will fail at one of these three steps and become food for the birds: mortality rates are very high.
They pair off like this as quickly as they can on landing but may not mate until they find a suitable location for a new colony. When and if that occurs, they go underground and stay there for the rest of their lives.
Another 60mm overnight, 27-28 December! A few more like this and 2015 won’t break the ‘driest year’ record, as looked likely a week ago.
Our driest year was 1969 (464mm) and our second driest year was 2001 (467mm). Our average is 1143mm, but we had only received 302mm by the beginning of this month (http://www.meteorology.com.au/local-climate-history/qld/townsville).