Termite queen: where she is and why it matters
With the subterranean termites that damage houses here, the queen is in the colony in the soil, not in the wood you find damaged. That is why what reaches the colony matters more than what reaches the termites you can see.
Who is in the colony
- Queen
- The largest in the colony, several times the mass of a worker. She lays the eggs.
- King
- The male reproductive, always by her side.
- Workers
- Wingless, soft-bodied and light caramel in colour. They feed the queen and the young, forage, and build the shelter tubes and galleries.
- Soldiers
- Larger heads and jaws; they defend the colony.
- Winged reproductives
- Two pairs of equal wings. They swarm out, shed their wings and try to start new colonies.
The colony, and where the queen sits in it
- 1The queen, deep in the nest, several times the mass of a worker, laying the eggs, with the king beside her.
- 2Workers travel the shelter tubes up to the wood, eat it, and carry food back down to feed the queen and the young.
- 3Soldiers, with larger heads and jaws, defend the colony. Whether soldier termites can bite a person has its own page.
- 4Winged reproductives swarm out, shed their wings and try to start new colonies.
The termites in a damaged door frame are the workers of number 2. The queen stays below, which is why a treatment has to reach the colony rather than the wood you can see.
Where the termite queen lives, and what that means for the house
Subterranean termites live and breed in the soil, sometimes well below the surface. The workers travel up through shelter tubes to the wood they eat and carry food back to the nest, feeding the queen and the young. The termites you see in a damaged door frame are those workers.
So spraying the wood you can see kills the workers in it and leaves the queen laying eggs underground. What ends an infestation is a treatment that reaches the colony: a barrier in the soil, or bait the workers carry back and share. Bait can take several months, or longer, and needs monitoring while it works. How that is done on a house is on anay and termite treatment.
The winged ones that swarm to your lights after rain are the next generation of kings and queens, leaving to start colonies of their own. A swarm outside does not always mean the house is infested; more in gamu-gamo sa loob ng bahay and anay sa bahay.
Regular inspections every three to five years help find an infestation before it does damage. We cover Pampanga, Bulacan, Bataan, Tarlac and Olongapo.
Source
University of California IPM, Subterranean and other termites, read 25 September 2026
Tell us what you have found
Send the pest, the town and roughly how long it has been going on. That is enough for us to say what the treatment would involve and what it depends on.