An ancient mystery found in deserts around the world has finally been solved after researchers finally got in touch with the Indigenous Australians who lived among them for thousands of years.
The large circles of hardened dirt, found in the deserts of Australia and parts of Africa and known colloquially as “fairy circles,” are actually formed by termites that live below the surface.
Spinifex termites have been documented for generations in paintings and stories of Aboriginal people in the area, who saw them evacuate their nests after heavy rainfall.
Scientists had originally concluded that the evenly spaced, thin circles of dirt were caused by plants competing for water under the soil.
Researchers working with the elders dug through the soil beneath the rocky surface in multiple locations, including in the Nyiyaparli country, east of Newman in Western Australia’s Pilbara region, and in the Northern Territory’s Warlpiri country to confirm the information.
Mysterious ‘fairy circles’ have been a mystery for centuries until Indigenous Australians recently pointed out answers to researchers
A team (pictured) found that the hardened dirt on top of these circles was caused by subsurface termites, not plants competing for water
The circles where the termites live are called ‘linyji’ in indigenous cultures, who used the hardened dirt and insects underneath to prepare food and meals.
‘We collected and ate the Warturnuma [flying termites] who flew from linyji,” said Martu elder Gladys Bidu.
“I learned this from my old people and have seen it myself many times.”
The project’s lead researcher, ethnoecologist Fiona Walsh, said studying central Australian land was part of her life’s work.
‘I’ve lived here for 30 years now and we first learned about the circles in the 1980s,’ Ms Walsh told Daily Mail Australia.
“My first acquaintance with their harsh areas was people using them for and other purposes in their daily lives.”
Ms Walsh’s interest in the fairy circles was renewed in 2016 when she compared aerial photographs of the circles to Aboriginal art and noticed they were almost exactly alike.
“Aborigines told us that these regular circular patterns of bare sidewalks are occupied by spinifex termites,” Ms Walsh said previously.
“The surface of the pavement is concrete hard — after we dug and then dusted to clean the trenches, 100 percent of them had termite chambers, both horizontally and vertically in the matrix.”
Although the mysterious circles were first noticed in Africa in the 1970s, Ms. Bidu said her people had been using them for generations to crack open seeds for use in food.
Ethnoecologist Fiona Walsh (pictured) led the team after 30 years in Central Australia, questioning her previous conclusion about the cause
Ms Walsh said she had seen Aboriginal people use the ‘concrete hard’ surface of these circles in numerous ways
After heavy rains allegedly fell, linyji held puddles of water and attracted Mulyamiji, a desert skink, which used its reserves in breeding and forced the termites to flee.
A story by Lee Nangala and Alice Nampijinpa about the termites was used in the study to help prove that plants were not behind the mystery.
Mr. Nangala was a child when pamapardu, flying termites, swarmed outside the ranger’s house where he and Mrs. Nampijinpa slept.
“Ngapa (rain) falls down, rain(s) every day,” said Mr. Nangala.
“Flying termites emerge from the soil and termite pavements,” Ms. Nampijinpa said.
Shared knowledge is the driving factor for new discoveries in research, Ms Walsh told Daily Mail Australia, and would continue to drive her own research.
“We will continue to learn from Aboriginal people, and their most important knowledge came from the elders,” she said.
After excavating several fairy circles at sites in WA and NT, Ms Walsh said 100 percent of them contained spinifex termites