Aussie Finch Forum

Great thankyou, just wondered, I do have some swamp grass, meadow hay, and so e white feathers I can give them ...the feathers do tend to blow everywhere though l.o.l

Hi Tiaris,

I notice you had 6 termite nests.
How do you go about getting the termites? Is there any specific procedure or just cut up the nest and bounce them out?
I have a lot of termite mounds on my block. Sort of lucky??

cheers

shayne

You need a garbage bin, a spade, a mattock and some wool grease or Vaseline. Try not to take more than a quarter of a mound, and never take the heart of the mound (where the queen and the eggs are). After you've got some, cover the hole in the mound with loose dirt, gently pushed down: this makes is much easier for the colony to repair the mound. In this way, I have continuously harvested the same mounds for some years in a row, and the mounds which have been used repeatedly in this way are much easier to harvest, as they have a 'soft side' where it has been harvested before. Keep them in a green garbage bin (?60L bin), with a smear of wool grease (Vaseline works too) around the lip to keep the white ants in and the black ants out. There are other ways of managing termite harvesting, some of which can be found by searching the forum, but this works for me.

mm.

excellent and thanks for the reply. I happened to have a spare bin and lid, will give me something to do this arvo.

Sorry I didn't see your question sooner. I just lever mine out of the ground with a spade. I went today & got another 12 nests in the 41 degree heat near Grafton. I put them in the paddock at home where they remain until I tumble them out one nest at a time. I have to tumble them out this arvo but I'll take a cool-off swim first.
There are plenty of species of termites with differing biology & the chances of your's up there being the same species as my local ones is very remote. You will need to experiment a bit to see what is the best way to collect them. Start by trying to rob the internal contents of the nest & rebuild with leaf litter & come back to the same nest in a few weeks/months to see if they recover.

shayne wrote:excellent and thanks for the reply. I happened to have a spare bin and lid, will give me something to do this arvo.

Hi Shayne,i see you mentioned a lid.Do not put the lid on your bin with a termite nest inside,it will go mouldy very quickly and kill all the termites.If you are going to store them out side,place a piece of corrigated iron on top for ventilation.If under cover place a hessian bag over the top. Craig