It has been shown that some separate colonies display relatively low aggression to each other and oftentimes result in colony fusion.
It is of note that these colonies will show massive aggression towards other colonies, indicating it is not a loss in aggressive behavior but a failure in recognition. It has been shown that colonies that exhibit this nonaggressive behavior have a relatively low average within-colony relatedness of .35, whereas colonies that retained mutually aggressive behavior had a higher relatedness average of .55. Nasutitermes corniger Scientific classification Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Arthropoda Class: Insecta Order: Blattodea Family: Termitidae Genus: Nasutitermes Species: N. corniger Binomial name Nasutitermes corniger Nasutitermes corniger is a species of arboreal termite that is endemic to the neotropics. The nonaggressive colonies often had polygamous reproductive individuals, and may have a broader template of acceptable odor clues, leading to recognition of other colonies.The number of fertile individuals produced by colonies of The termites are thought to benefit from the association as the ants leave debris in the nest containing While specific studies have not been done in N. corniger, similar species in Microcerotermes and many other termites show that they are able to detect scent on each other. It is very closely related to Nasutitermes ephratae. This implies that there is a method of kin recognition among N. corniger that allow it to distinguish between its colony and the next. The species has been studied relatively intensively, particularly on Barro Colorado Island, Panama. The benefits to being altruistic come in two ecological modes: “life insurers” and “fortress defenders”.Nasutitermes corniger exhibits a large amount of aggression to rival conspecific colonies. These studies and others have shown that the