Termites are apt to be most prevalent in the warmer countries more than the cooler ones, but if where you live is infected by timber-eating termites, regulating them should be towards the top of your priorities, especially if you are a home-owner or a farmer. Of the 4,000 species of termite, about 400 of them pose a serious threat to timber buildings and crops.
Ants and ant-eaters are the termites natural enemies, but this does not help man to control them, so we have resorted to chemicals. Most of the chemicals used to manage termites are fairly safe to humans, their pets and their livestock, although it does no harm to exercise a little vigilance while spreading them about.
The first thing you ought to do if you would like to banish termites from your home, is comprehend a little about them. They prefer to eat a plank of timber starting at the end-grain and tunneling up inside it, so before you next redecorate your house, saturate all timber in preservative and termite poison particularly the end-grain. Then repaint, stain or varnish everything as usual.
If you make it difficult or unappetizing for them, termites are apt to go for easier pickings. Likewise, if you have walkways, crawling spaces or air ducts, spray them with termiticide. If you have wet areas near the house remedy the cause of the damp, because termites love damp earth.
Clear up any clutter from about the base of your house such as old leaves and weeds, because that holds moisture as well. If you have a stack of garden rubbish, burn it; if you have a compost heap, turn it over on a regular basis and check for termites (and carpenter ants).
In a termite nest, it is only the female workers that go out and scavenge. They then take this back to the colony an give it to the nymphs, the soldiers and the king and queen. If you poison that food source, all those bugs will die and the nymphs in the unhatched eggs will starve to death.
Most termiticides act on two levels, there is the poison to get eaten, but there is also an element to the poison that kills on contact, although it might take some time.
When a termite rubs up against this contact poison, it will go home sooner or later where it will groom and become groomed by its pals, which passes the contact poison around the nest very quickly.
It can take a week or longer for say 90% of the nest to get wiped out, but it could take another month or so for the remaining 10% to die, because they may be getting their food from another source.
However, sooner or later they will begin taking the dead corpses of their dropped comrades outside and as soon as they do that, they will get a brushing of contact poison as well.
When this happens their days are numbered even if the poison is a little bit older and a little less potent. The trick is not to give up too soon and keep checking for a re-infestation, because if they came once, they may come back again.
Owen Jones, the writer of this piece, writes on many subjects, but is at present involved with pictures of termites. If you are interested in this or if you are wondering: What Does A Termite Look Like?. just go to our web site now for some more details.