Wilton Simpson Commissioner
Termites associated with structures in Florida
This website,https://www.flexotictermites.org/, was developed through a grant (UF grant AWD18935) funded by the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Wilton Simpson Commissioner. In August 2024, the FDACS Pest Control Research Advisory Committee formulated a list of research and education topics to fund. The Committee’s top priority was “Invasive termite species/identification”. On 12 March 2025 members of the Pest Control Enforcement Advisory Council, under the chairmanship of Sean Brantley, elected to fund my proposal entitled “Identification of Invasive Termite Species, Native Economic Species, and Future Termite Invaders of Florida”.
Rudolf H. Scheffrahn
I have had the privilege of spending my entire professional career at the UF/IFAS Research and Education Center in Davie, Florida. With the help of many fine pest control professionals in Florida and beyond, I gained access to many sites where field work was practiced and I could observe.
It would have been impossible to acquire all the Florida termite samples in the UF collection (currently 9,483) without the significant samples given to me by members of the Florida pest control industry and FDACS inspectors including especially: Marco Acosta, Ivan Advincula, Sue Alspach, Breck Amick, Heidi Arias, Paul Ban, Michael Beckers, Bob Benham, Ron Box, Sean Brantley, Sandy Burger, Lyle Buss, Bob Caine, Rey Cardenas, Gabe Centeno, Jim Chase, Mike Chrzan, Thomas Chouvenc, Marco Costa, Todd Cronin, Kevin Cunningham, Mary Cohen, Llyod Davis, Raul Dominguez, Marcie Downing, Kim Gabel, Robin Giblin-Davis, Bruce Edwards, Jeff Edwards, Bernard Hsiao, Joe Jovanovich, Harry Katz, Bill Kern, Jerry Lamb, Rafael Lee, Gil Livingston, Rich Lucas, Vinda Maharajh, Jim Mahler, Dan Malone, John Mangold, Mark Maupin, Paul Matola, Harry Myers, Lance McDonald, Aaron Mullins, Harry Myers, Scott Ness, Renny Perez, Alex Napoles, Michael Petrozzino, Jude Plummer, Billy Porter, Alvin Puzio, Bruce Ryser, Norm Sage, Paul Sagrue, David Seranno, Richard Silvani, Bert Silver, Chris Socco, Nan-Yao Su, Paul Sugrue, Jim Stanton, Katie Tenn, Ellen Thoms, Hugh Turner, Frank Valdes, Douglas Vanderpoest, John Warner, Larry Weinberg, Mark Weinberg, and Michael Wilson.