Ancient Termite Nests Named After Calitzdorp Town
Researchers have named 400,000-year-old fossilised termite nests from South Africa after Calitzdorp, the Little Karoo town near which the meter-deep structures were found.
University of Cape Town researchers have named a series of approximately 400,000-year-old fossilised underground nests of an extinct termite species after Calitzdorp, the Little Karoo town near which they were found. The fossilised termite nests Calitzdorp study, published in the Journal of Quaternary Science and reported on 2 November 2026, describes pipe-like nests that reach at least a metre underground. The structures were identified as Columnanidus calitzdorpensis, a new ichnogenus and ichnospecies of termite, named for the distinctive cylindrical burrows and chambers that the insects built beneath the surface long ago.
A local artist discovered the unusual pipe-like features in the early 2000s, and researchers later recognised them as trace fossils, the preserved signs of animal activity rather than the animals themselves. According to uranium-series dating, the structures are between 323,000 and 401,000 years old, placing them in the Middle Pleistocene. The remarkably preserved nests provide a rare glimpse into the underground world of an ancient termite species, showing how insects shaped soil and built complex homes hundreds of thousands of years before the present day. In October 2026, the research team returned to Calitzdorp to donate a poster documenting the discovery to the town museum.
Why fossilised termite nests Calitzdorp matter
The study, led by Dr. Miengah Abrahams, a senior lecturer in geological sciences at the University of Cape Town, shows that trace fossils can reveal behaviour that body fossils cannot, including how deeply insects dug and how they organised their nests. Researchers are planning further investigations into similar fossilised termite and ant nests in the Northern Cape and around Western Cape towns such as Ceres and Worcester. For local communities, the naming connects a global scientific find to a specific place, and the museum poster helps share the region’s fossil heritage with residents and visitors who walk the same ground today.
Source: Phys.org
