How do drywood termites move around?
Drywood termites create winged alates or swarmers that will leave the colony once the colony matures so they can create their own colony. Swarming activities mostly happen at dusk or during the night. They are attracted to light and may be seen hovering around lampposts or lights outside the house.
Termites can easily be transferred from one property to another if they are transported with the wood in which they live. Any wood carried from a house that's infested with termites, may contain a queen termite that is capable enough to grow a new colony in a different place.
Some of the best ways to get rid of termites is to apply termite-killing products to your home's exterior, use direct chemicals on the inside of your home, set up termite baits, and spray boric acid in your floors and walls.
Make a solution of borax powder and water and spray it on the affected areas to get rid of termites at home. It's a non-toxic method and ensures termites in cupboards and other wooden furniture vanish after a few applications.
Termite swarming only happens once per year, and most colonies swarm for only 30 to 40 minutes.
Drywood termites are not only difficult to detect, but they're also hard to eliminate. Unlike subterranean termites, drywood termites do not enter structures through contact with soil. They typically enter homes through infested items, such as wooden furniture.
- Always seal up the holes or cracks on your home's exterior.
- Keep checking the firewood or any other wood and furniture in your house and keep them a few inches off the ground if possible.
Termites take a very short time to spread. Within a few days, they can multiply to what's considered an infestation. Homeowners need to take every percaussion possible, and be sure to act quickly in order to protect their homes.
First, if you don't spot any swarmers or live termites, there's likely no current termite activity. Secondly, if you notice mud tubes and break off a section that remains unrepaired after a few days, you have an inactive termite infestation.
Sunlight. Termites hate sunlight. In fact, they can die from too much sunlight and heat exposure. If you suspect that a piece of furniture has termites, drag it to the yard to bake in the sun for a bit.
What naturally keeps termites away?
Boric acid is often recommended for the elimination of termites. Boric acid is a natural pesticide and usually comes in the powder form. You can sprinkle it in the area of infestation or mix it with water to spray in the area.
Clemson University scientists reported that 'Termites hate smells of cedarwood, geranium, and tea tree oil. It has also been found that clove bud, cinnamon, and garlic oils can also repel termites.
Sadly, no kind of treatment offers a permanent solution for eliminating termites in your house. Termites are quite resilient and will always find a way back into your home given a chance. However, usually, it should take at least five years before termites can finally find their way back into your home.
The bad news is that in some cases, termites come back after treatment. In fact, they're some of the toughest pests to eliminate from a property.
As a general rule of thumb whenever a termite swarm is observed, that means the colony has been actively consuming wood in the house for about 3 to 5 years.
Sulfuryl fluoride kills drywood termites within several days. A monitored fumigation, which involves installing gas monitoring lines inside the structure undergoing treatment, has the highest rate of treatment success.
For some African species of termites, a queen's life span may be up to 50 years, while in other species, such as drywood termites, the queens live only 10 to 12 years. In general, worker termites live about two years.
Drywood Feces
Other drywood termite signs include tiny mounds of termite droppings (called frass). Bubbling or peeling paint, or a hollow sound when you tap on a wall are further signs of drywood activity.
Like heat treatment, liquid nitrogen treatment allows you to treat termites without tenting your entire home. Since you can't buy large amounts of liquid nitrogen, professionals should handle this treatment.
A drywood termite likes to eat. And unlike its subterranean counterparts, it does not need moist soil or water nearby in order to thrive. Because they don't need water, these termites are often found in dry wood above ground level.
Do drywood termites eat drywall?
While termites prefer a diet of the cellulose in wood, they are absolutely willing to chew through other objects that contain cellulose to fill themselves up. For example, termites can and will chew through all kinds of building materials, including soil, sheetrock and, yes, drywall.
There are several commercially available products that you can spray on wood to protect it from termites. Without promoting certain brands, products that have the active ingredient disodium octaborate tetrahydrate are commonly used to spray onto wood to protect the wood from termites.
Young termites—aka nymphs—cause the most burrowing damage in their effort to help build the colony. A typical colony of drywood termites takes about four years to mature, all the while chowing down on wood and damaging your structure.
Two of the types of termites that are found in California are drywood termites and subterranean termites. Drywood termites can create colonies of up to 3,000 and often cause damage to the wood framing in attics.
The Age of the Colony
A new colony can have about 100,000 workers at the ready, but an older colony can have about 2 million termites. With about 2 million termites working in the right condition they can cause significant damage within the first few months. A home can be totally destroyed in a year or two.