Walter Kirn

Novelists who pretend to understand what keeps them scribbling are really just guessing. A profound, unmet childish need to be acknowledged? Maybe. It hardly matters, though. The termite that asks itself why it keeps chewing risks becoming sluggish and inefficient, as does the writer who grows self-conscious in the middle of chapter five.

American Novelist

Mary Roach

In terms of sustainability and what we eat and what its footprint is on the environment and the consequences of eating one thing versus another, obviously it makes a lot of sense to be eating insects. They're incredibly plentiful. They've got a very short turnover rate. You could be eating termites.

American Author

Allan Bloom

Shakespeare's naturalness is attested to by the strange fact that he is the only classical author who remains popular. The critical termites are massed and eating away at the foundations, trying to topple him. Whether they will succeed will be a test of his robustness.

American Philosopher

I have not eaten a lot of insects. I ate a termite in Africa, but it was on a bet. It was a soldier termite. It was alive, and I don't really recommend the live soldier termite as something you want to start with if you're going to start exploring eating insects.

E. O. Wilson

But once the ants and termites jumped the high barrier that prevents the vast variety of evolving animal groups from becoming fully social, they dominated the world.

American Scientist

Amit Shah

The illegal immigrants are like termites. They are eating the grain that should go to the poor; they are taking our jobs.

Indian Politician

Millions of infiltrators have entered our country and are eating the country like termites. Should we not uproot them?

Joseph B. Wirthlin

Remember this: debt is a form of bondage. It is a financial termite.

American Businessman

Alice Hastings Bradley

I have personal problems like other people have termites.

Henry Winkler

Assumptions are the termites of relationships.

American Actor

The word 'termite' often implies destruction or hidden damage when used metaphorically.

Negative Connotation

Frequently paired words with 'termite' reflect the damage they cause or measures taken against them.

Common Collocations

'Termite' is usually used in contexts discussing structural harm to buildings or wood products.

Damage Context

 The baboon just went off a few hundred metres and sat behind the nearest termite mound. It's pretty grim, not the sort of thing you can show on any screen. The baboon slowly ate the baby alive as it bleated for its mother, and that's the image and memory I have. In the space of maybe 5 minutes I witness the full, gruesome circle of life.

Fatal Encounter with...

 termites and grubs and that's exactly what our bears are doing in the enclosure but we supplement that with things like eggs as well I love their eggs we buy over 50 tons of food every year from the local market and this food is grown by the local communities so we're not only supporting bears but

Feeding 39 Hungry Moon...

 This single determined termite is braving countless threats to participate in the only flight of her lifetime. She evades the onslaught of predators even as she lands, flips off her wings, secretes pheromones, and attracts a mate. The pair dash from the danger zone into a rotting tree stump.

Coneheads, egg stacks...

 Deep in the bowels of the nest lives the termite queen. If she is killed, the entire colony will die out. She must be protected, so termites start to isolate her from the fighting by building a wall of mud mixed with saliva that will harden like concrete.

Defending the ant nest...

 sit behind bars in zoos, languishing. That's why we build space shuttles and cathedrals while the rest of the world sticks sticks into the ground to extract termites. All right, if this view of language and its value

Mark Pagel: How language...

 you're 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 royal treatment you are

Termite Queen Lays...

 arch collapses it is a powerful metaphor elephants termites bees are a keystone species now to get a grasp of the bigger picture it is important that you learn how to understand just a little differently

Rediscovering ourselves...

 So, we must ask if an architect could design a self cooling building with termite inspired climate control, what other innovations can Mother Nature inspire if we just paid closer attention?

See How Termites...

 the ants penetrate deep into the nest and the residents intensify their warning first blood is to the termites

5 Reasons Ants Are...

 about this complex treetop world she must learn how to collect ants and termites