Lizard Man's Travels

This site is a journal of my travels and other adventures while I shift from doing postdoctoral research on tree frog ecology in Darwin, Australia, to research on digestive physiology of lizards and bats in Sede Boqer, Israel. Enough friends have been asking me for regular updates on this journey, that I thought this would be the best forum to keeep everyone up to date (including me).

Tuesday, November 08, 2005

magnetic termites


magnetic termites
Originally uploaded by wandering lizard.
Just outside Litchfield Park, I ran into this field of magnetic termite mounds. They align themselves to take advantage of sun at certain times of the year. They are reallly huge - some looked to be about 4m tall - but thin. The ones here were about 3m tall, and about 50cm thick at the base, dropping to <20cm at the top.

Somehow, I managed to get a photo without any 4X4 tracks, or upturned mounds, but that was a challenge. Apparently, it is irresistable to drive around in the mud around these, and test your manliness by seeing how big a mound you can knock over. Fortunately, many are still in one piece. And I did see one upturned mound that had started to recover. It looked a bit funny, since the new mound was growing at right angles to the old one.

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