Re: Do beavers accidently eat termites? How do they taste to beavers?

Hi Timea (and Dad):

In North America, particularly in Canada (where there happen to be a lot of beavers) most species of termites belong to families known as Damp-wood (or rottenwood) termites, or Subterranean termites (e.g. see here for a list). They are found primarily in soils or in wet, rotting wood, and beavers usually only eat live trees (and mostly the bark, at that).
During much of the year beavers eat non-woody food, things like grasses, leaves, ferns, and algae - green stuff! In the fall, they eat more woody diets, which is usually the bark of deciduous trees. So in general, I would say that beavers do not frequently eat termites.

However, there are drywood termites in some of the southern states, and there are beavers there as well. I haven't been able to find reference to beavers eating termites specifically, but I'm willing to go out on a limb and say that probably, at some place and some time, a beaver has eaten a termite. I do doubt that it happens a lot.

And whether they like the taste or not? I can't really tell you - we don't speak beaver! And as far as I'm aware, nobody has ever done any experiments to see if beavers like to eat termites.

I hope that helps!
Rob Campbell, MAD Scientist

PS, in my searching around, I found this great site, that has all kinds of information about termites, if you're interested in learning more about them.