Showing posts with label pest management. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pest management. Show all posts

Monday 13 November 2017

Save Your Garden & Furniture From Wood Boring Insects

Large timber worm and conifer ambrosia beetle are dangerous wood boring species. They can do considerable economical damage mostly to stored timber.
Over the last few years, there has been a significant rise in beetle populations due to the following factors:
  • Because of rising economic pressures and high costs, timber harvesting operations have been rationalised. New age, close-to-nature forestry practices result in higher amounts of residual and dead wood, which is an ideal breeding ground and habitat for wood boring insects.
  • Timber felled during fall/winter, (storm or logging) which is not removed but left unprotected in the forest, can be extremely susceptible to infestation due to low wood moisture in the spring season. 
  • Insufficient irrigation of timber is also at high risk in spring.

General steps for prevention
  • Hiring a reputed and competent pest management team in North Shore 
  • Removal of (coniferous) timber to a safe place as quickly as possible when insects are flying and where infestations have already started.
  • Use storage sites free from local insect populations and avoid sites with infestations in the previous year.
  • Dry storage of debarked timber, wet storage on irrigation sites or conservation under oxygen exclusion.

Protection of individual objects

Apply insecticides by hiring pest control professionals to keep away wood boring insects. Do this straight after you notice infestation to protect high-value timber in storage. Limit application to a few exceptional cases based on experiences from the previous year, for example, protection of valuable timbers like oak stems. Several precautionary steps may be applied to soft and hardwood before the beetles fly. Remember, severe infestations by wood boring insects may not always be prevented. This is why, it is a good idea to call in the professional pest controllers as the first preventive measure.

Identifying beetles

Wood boring beetles generally leave behind a fine, powder-like frass made out of a mixture of feces and wood fragments. They like to infest on hardwoods as they lay their eggs into wood pores that are only found on hardwoods and not in softwoods. Wood boring beetles prefer dry wood with a moisture content as low as 8 percent. Infestation is usually to new furniture or structures as they rarely infest anything older than 5 years.
Wood boring beetles are far more dangerous than termites and thus, you should take action against them as soon as you notice.