Journal of Threatened Taxa |
www.threatenedtaxa.org | 26 June 2020 | 12(9): 16187–16189
ISSN 0974-7907 (Online) | ISSN 0974-7893
(Print)
doi: https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.5510.12.9.16187-16189
#5510 | Received 29 October 2019 | Final
received 03 June 2020 | Finally accepted 10 June 2020
Carcass consumption by Nasutitermes callimorphus
(Blattodea: Isoptera) in
highland forests from Brazil
Igor Eloi 1, Mário Herculano de Oliveira 2 & Maria Avany
Bezerra-Gusmão 3
1,2,3 Programa de Pós-Graduação
em Ecologia e Conservação, Universidade Estadual da Paraíba, CEP
58429-500, Campina Grande - Paraíba, Brazil.
1 eloi.igor@yandex.com
(corresponding author), 2 mariohecules@hotmail.com, 3 bezerra.gusmao@uepb.edu.br
Editor: K.A. Subramanian, Zoological
Survey of India, Chennai, India. Date of publication:
26 June 2020 (online & print)
Citation: Eloi, I., M.H. de Oliveira & M.A. Bezerra-Gusmao (2020). Carcass consumption by Nasutitermes
callimorphus (Blattodea:
Isoptera) in highland forests from Brazil. Journal of Threatened Taxa 12(9): 16187–16189. https://doi.org/10.11609/jott.5510.12.9.16187-16189
Copyright: © Eloi et al. 2020. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
License. JoTT
allows unrestricted use, reproduction, and distribution of this article in any
medium by providing adequate credit to the author(s) and the source of
publication.
Funding: None.
Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests.
Despite the small number of
species, termites (Blattodea: Isoptera)
are among world’s most representative organisms regarding biomass (Bignell & Eggleton
2000). These insects are mainly known
from wood-feeding, which is universal among the lower termites (exporadically other items might be used as food, but no
specialization in feeding habit is known), however, the higher termites (Termitidae) were able to diversify their diet and occupy
many previously available niches (Bucek et al.
2019). Besides plant material, higher
termites are mainly reported as feeding on fungi, lichens, humus, other
termite’s faeces, nest materials, dead siblings (intra-colonial cannibalism)
and, rarely, on mammal carcasses (Lima & Costa-Leonardo 2007). Wood (1978) lists parts of vertebrate carrion
as “special or incidental” items in the diet of these insects. Freymann et al. (2007) have observed that termites from the
genus Odontotermes may frequently forage on
carrion (hooves), but that item might represent a way to supplement on macro
and micro-nutrient, rather than a main source of energy.
The termite genus with the higher
number of species, Nasutitermes Dudley, 1890
(around 248 extant taxa), comprise wood feeding insects and is present through
most of the world’s tropical territory, with some species being regarded as
notorious pests in the Neotropics (Constantino
2002). Despite the amount of living
species only N. corniger (Queiroz et al.
2017), N. nigriceps (Thorne & Kimsey 1983) were previously reported as feeding on mammal
carcasses (excluding reports of damage on archaeological sites, which we don’t
consider here). Here we report a third
species of Nasutitermes feeding on mammal
carrion.
The observation was made during a
field trip on 11 August 2016 in the highland humid forest state reserve Mata do
Pau Ferro (6.9620S & 357540W) (Image 1). With 607ha of protected woodland, the park is
located 9km away from the municipality of Areia, Paraíba, Brazil. The
altitude ranges from 400m to 600m and observed precipitation during the sample
month is registered to be 26.8mm (annual rainfall=1208.3mm) (AESA 2019).
A common house dog Canis familiaris
skull was found partially covered by carton sheets typically made by Nasutitermes spp. (Image 2). Inside the skull, multiple workers and
soldiers were found and collected (preserved in 80% alcohol), as well as the bones. The termites were identified as Nasutitermes callimorphus
Mathews, 1977 (Image 3), a common species inside Brazilian evergreen
forests. This species does not build a
separated termitarium, rather lives within dead wood
covered in carton sheets or in underground galleries. They can be commonly found in carton
galleries built over the soil surface or in foraging parties constituted by
many large workers and soldiers. The food
content from the gut of workers collected from the carrion had a ferruginous
red colouration, hinting that termites might be feeding on muscle leftovers.
Most termites species reported as
carrion feedings are also reported as damage-causing in other reports (Prestes et al. 2014).
These commonalities tempt one to suppose that saprophily
in termites can be related to the feeding plasticity (a trait ever so frequent
in pest species). However, N. callimorphus belongs with Rhynchothermes
nasutissimus (Silvestri, 1901) (Prestes et al. 2014) in a group of termites that do not
represent a threat to anthropic activities such as agriculture or habitational
buildings.
The majority of carrion feeding
reports were made during dry seasons, suggesting that termites may explore
carcasses as a supplementary source of nutrients (Thorne & Kimsey 1983). Our
sample took place during a time period in which el niño
had prolonged dry season into a particularly tough drought (Figure 1). This (plus previous reports) supports the
hypothesis of drought being a force driving necrophagous behaviour in termites,
allowing one to hypothesize that climate change may play a key role in niche
exploration by termites and therefore in the rise of new adaptations.
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