Termite

Termites are a group of small, pale, soft-bodied insects found across most of the world's warmer regions, best known for living in highly organized colonies that can number in the millions and for building some of the largest structures produced by any animal, including towering earthen mounds in parts of Africa and Australia. A colony is divided into castes, workers, soldiers and reproductive individuals headed by a king and queen, with the queen of some species capable of living for decades and laying thousands of eggs a day. Termites feed primarily on dead plant material, especially wood, breaking down cellulose with the help of specialized gut microbes, a role that makes them important decomposers in many ecosystems even as their appetite for timber makes them a costly pest of buildings. Despite a reputation as household pests, only a small fraction of the roughly three thousand known termite species regularly damage human structures.