Two Invasive Termites Are Interbreeding in Florida, Raising Concerns That the Hybrid Pests Could Spread Around the World
Previous research found that Asian and Formosan termites could produce offspring together, and now, scientists have found these creatures established in the wild
Two invasive termite species are chewing their way across South Florida—and it turns out they’re breeding with each other in the process. The resulting hybrid termite, identified in a lab in 2015, could potentially travel farther to cause damage than its parent species.
Now, researchers from the University of Florida have found that the two termites—Asian and Formosan termites, which are among the world’s most destructive—have established hybrid colonies in the wild. The work was published in late May in Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
Scientists have long had an inkling that the termites might be interbreeding. More than a decade ago, entomologist Thomas Chouvenc was catching winged termites, when he found both Formosan and Asian termites at the same time—even though the two species had never been known to swarm together.
Then, in lab work in 2015, he and his colleagues discovered that the termites can create hybrids—and that these new colonies are larger and faster-growing than those of their parent species. In fact, when Chouvenc gave a male Asian termite the choice between a female Asian termite and a female Formosan termite, it preferred to breed with the female Formosan termite, as Live Science’s Laura Geggel reported at the time.
The next step was to search for these hybrid colonies in the wild, but finding them can be like “looking for a needle in a haystack,” Chouvenc says in a statement. Researchers spent more than ten years monitoring known areas where the two termites’ ranges overlap. But it wasn’t until 2021 that they spotted winged termites that appeared to be hybrids.
“At first, I could not believe it, as I was hoping to never find it,” Chouvenc says in the statement. Analysis of the termites’ DNA revealed they get half of their genes from each invasive species.
More observations made it clear that these hybrid termites were not a fluke—the team has collected them from swarms every year since 2021, including in April 2025. And in October last year, entomologists discovered the first known wild location of an established hybrid termite colony, which was infesting a tree in Fort Lauderdale.
The work suggests these hybrid termites have been tunneling underfoot for years. The Fort Lauderdale colony “was most likely established there for more than five years before we could even detect it,” Chouvenc says in the statement. “And there are most likely many hundreds more out there that have already established throughout urban South Florida.”
Researchers worry these large colonies could be equally as destructive as their parent species and spread across more of the United States. While Asian termites need a tropical climate to survive, Formosan termites can thrive in more temperate climates. The hybrid offspring, if they take after the Formosan species, might be able to live in a wider geographic range.
“If that’s the case, then these colonies, in addition to spreading on their own, could be moved around by people,” entomologist Ed Vargo of Texas A&M University who was not affiliated with the research, told NPR’s Greg Allen in 2015. “You’d have this sort of highly destructive super-termite potentially cause very extensive damage in those areas where it can become established.”
And the infestations might not stop at the U.S.—Fort Lauderdale is known as the “yacht capital of the world,” per the statement, and it has already been notorious for spreading invasive termites by boat.
“Viable hybrids of these two species would likely lead to a super-invasive termite that could potentially have a huge suitable range worldwide, and that could do important damages,” Edouard Duquesne, a macroecologist at the Free University of Brussels who was not involved in the study, tells New Scientist’s Jake Buehler.
Because the termites have been interbreeding for as long as a decade, scientists can’t stop them from hybridizing now. But staying aware of termite colonies and learning about the new offspring can inform management strategies.
“[Humans] allowed these termites to spread because we were not really paying attention,” Chouvenc says to New Scientist. “Now we are kind of paying the price for it.”
You can spot termite infestations by looking for damaged wood, termite wings, droppings and mud tubes on walls, as Jeremy Logsdon, owner of Preventive Pest Control in Houston, tells Realtor.com’s Anna Baluch. You can help keep termites out of your home by reducing wood-to-soil contact, cleaning gutters and checking for leaks or damp areas in the basement or crawl spaces.
The development is consistent with how surprising termites can be. Chouvenc, who moved from France to South Florida just to study termites, told NPR, “I come to work every day and I get surprised every day. Termites will do things you just don’t expect.”