let’s go inside one of the most
remarkable most fascinating and well
most disgusting places on earth and we
mean that in the best sense of the word
let’s go inside a termite nest a factory
ventilated by air shafts and where
termites produce more termites we’re in
the Queen’s Chamber the heart of the
nest imagine you’re the queen there
attended by millions of sterile worker
termites who live to feed you groom you
and carry your eggs away when you lay
them you aren’t acting helpless because
you think you need oil treatment you are
hopeless see a termite Queens head is
nearly as small as the rest of the
termites in the colony but she’s
rendered immobile by her four inch
throbbing pulsating cake machine of an
abdomen how many eggs can this body
produce take a guess would you say
hundreds a day maybe I don’t know a
thousand a high-performance Queen like
this one can produce well let’s do the
math 30,000 eggs in one day times 365
days a year
that’s ten million 950,000 eggs times
fifteen years the life of a queen this
body will crank out 164 million 250,000
eggs in her lifetime – huh no wonder she
needs so many attendants it’s one of
their jobs to carry all those eggs to
cells where they hatch into fragile nips
these nips were thought to be more
workers whose job it is to continually
build and repair the nest
supply it with food and water and care
for the Queen in this turbine Factory
the royal assembly line never shuts down
remarkable most fascinating and well
most disgusting places on earth and we
mean that in the best sense of the word
let’s go inside a termite nest a factory
ventilated by air shafts and where
termites produce more termites we’re in
the Queen’s Chamber the heart of the
nest imagine you’re the queen there
attended by millions of sterile worker
termites who live to feed you groom you
and carry your eggs away when you lay
them you aren’t acting helpless because
you think you need oil treatment you are
hopeless see a termite Queens head is
nearly as small as the rest of the
termites in the colony but she’s
rendered immobile by her four inch
throbbing pulsating cake machine of an
abdomen how many eggs can this body
produce take a guess would you say
hundreds a day maybe I don’t know a
thousand a high-performance Queen like
this one can produce well let’s do the
math 30,000 eggs in one day times 365
days a year
that’s ten million 950,000 eggs times
fifteen years the life of a queen this
body will crank out 164 million 250,000
eggs in her lifetime – huh no wonder she
needs so many attendants it’s one of
their jobs to carry all those eggs to
cells where they hatch into fragile nips
these nips were thought to be more
workers whose job it is to continually
build and repair the nest
supply it with food and water and care
for the Queen in this turbine Factory
the royal assembly line never shuts down
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