Introduction
When you walk around town or even a walk around campus, it is hard to argue against the aesthetic value of wood buildings. The uniqueness of every plank, the natural color of the wood that nature provides us with. Many residential buildings in this country are built from wood, wooden studs that are framed and it serves as the backbone to many homes in America. Wood is an essential part of construction and many buildings all around the world, but unfortunately there is a glooming issue that seems to haunt many homes: termites. Termites are insects that are similar to the size of ants, but they feast on wood especially in the southern climates in our country.
The image above shows the impact that termites have on our buildings. This is a structural beam that has been completely damaged due to termite damage, who have eaten a large portion of this beam. As you can see, letting termites into our homes and eating the wooden structures that hold up our homes is incredibly dangerous; they slowly but surely permanently damage your home through sagging floors and ceilings. According to American Pest, “termites cost U.S. property owners over $5 billion dollars each year … [and] around 600,000 residential homes are affected” (American Pest, 2015). Along with the incredible financial consequences of termite damage, it is also incredibly dangerous to you and your family, as “one small termite colony of 60,000 can eat a 2” x 4” in just five months” (American Pest, 2015). For you and your family’s sake, we must prevent and protect our wood buildings from termites at any cost.
Subterranean Termites
There are two different types of termites, subterranean and non subterranean termites. However, according to the textbook, subterranean termites are “responsible for most of the termite damage to wood structures in the United States… Subterranean termites are more prevalent in the southern than in the northern states, where low temperatures do not favor their development” (Clausen). These termites need a constant source of moisture, so buildings with the greatest risks are ones built on a concrete slab foundation or with a poorly drained crawl space and a lack of moisture barrier. These termites feed on wood with higher moisture content and only certain types of woods.
Prevention
The best method to protect buildings from termites is to prevent them from ever even coming into your house. According to a publication done by the Virginia Cooperative Extension, they listed out nine methods that are relatively easy to do in order to prevent termites from entering your home. Here are a couple of them:
Repairing structural and plumbing leaks. This method helps to prevent subterranean termites because these leaks create a moist environment for these termites, and they require constant moisture to survive.
Put all mulch and landscaping back at least 6 inches from the foundation. Again, this also prevents a moisture problem that is caused from the watering of the landscaping.
Make sure downspouts are long enough to direct water away from the foundation. If water is pointed in the wrong direction towards your foundation, it once again causes a moisture problem.
Avoid direct wood-to-ground contact when building porches or decks. Direct wood to ground contact is a big culprit for termite infestations, as this wood will easily get moist from the rain and normal weather conditions that occur throughout the year.
Treatment
It is hard to prevent termites from entering your home due to the weather conditions that call for termites to breed in your homes in certain geographical locations. If unfortunately your home is infested by subterranean termites, there are a couple of methods that could be implemented to eliminate them.
The first method of subterranean termite treatment is through liquid applications of a chemical called termiticides. Since these termites reside in the soil, an effective termiticide will create a barrier between the soil they live in and the wooden structure (your home) that they feed on. For the ones that are already in the home, the barrier also acts as a prevention method of the termites being able to return back to their soil, which will cause them to die.
Repellent termiticides. There are two types of termiticides, a repellent and a non-repellant one. A repellent termiticide is a pyrethroid, which, according to the Virginia Cooperation Extension, are “fast acting nerve poisons that are highly toxic to termites but have low toxicity to mammals… [they] are also highly repellent to termites. In most cases, they are so repellent that termites foraging under the soil will avoid coming into contact with the termiticide and forage elsewhere” (Miller, 2010). Obviously, the biggest benefit of using this liquid is that it is a repellant, the termites will not be able to get through this chemical and the barrier it places between the soil and the structure it is trying to get to. However, the one negative of using this is that termites will immediately be able to sense the termiticide, and because applications are never 100% full coverage, termites may be able to identify these holes in the application and enter the home that way.
Non-repellent termiticide. Unlike repellent termiticides, these non-repellent termiticides are not able to be identified by termites in the soil and therefore eliminates the concern of a completely perfect application. According to Miller, this treatment works through the termites contacting the chemical, and through this contact during foraging, they die. Three popular brands of non-repellant termiticides are Premise, Termidor, and Phantom. Each of these has their own unique active ingredient that will kill the termites. Although non-repellent termiticides are effective through killing them on upon contact, the one drawback of these are that they are more expensive than the repellent termiticides. Another drawback of these are that although they do not require a perfect application to work, if termites are able to get through the gaps from user error, they are still able to enter the home.
This is a graphic illustrating how Termidor, a non-repellent termiticide, works (Lomax).
The second method of treating subterranean termites that have entered your home is through setting up baits. In a liquid termiticide, the goal is to create a barrier between the soil and the house so that the termite cannot enter the house. In a bait method, the goal is to lead them into a bait and trap them and hopefully eliminate the entire colony that lives near the house. According to Miller from the Virginia Cooperation Extension, installing a termite bait “involves plastic stations being inserted into the ground around the periphery of the structure approximately every 10 feet. Inside these stations are untreated wood monitors. The stations are usually inspected either once a month or every 3 months (quarterly) for termite activity” (Miller, 2010). For termites that have already entered the home, an above-ground bait system can be installed inside the house, where baits are placed inside and the termites eat the bait.
There are many bait systems, but one of the most popular ones is called Sentricon. According to Michael Potter from the University of Kentucky, Sentricon “has been the most extensively tested of those currently on the market” (Potter, 2004). Sentricon contains an ingredient in there that disrupts normal activities of termites. For example, termites molt, and with Sentricon, the ingredient will kill the termites as they attempt to molt. This system works in a three step process, and they are:
Monitoring. Like previously mentioned above, all baits are pretty similar as they require plastic stations inserted into the ground and are left there for monitoring. Inside these baits are two pieces of wood that are not treated with any chemicals, and over a period of time these are taken out for examination.
This is an image of the baits being set in place (Potter, 2004).
Bait delivery. The second step after monitoring these termites with the wood samples as baits is to take all the termites eating on the wood into a little plastic tube which is perforated and contains “bait laced with a slow-acting termite growth inhibitor (noviflumuron)” (Potter, 2004). The termites will continue to live their lives, but this bait will slowly kill them.
The image on the left shows the collection of termites after a period of monitoring. The
image on the right shows the plastic bait being placed back in the system for more collection (Potter, 2004).
Continued monitoring. After these two steps, monitoring should continue to be followed, as fresh untreated wood are placed again and the process continues until no more termites exist in the specific location. In order to ensure complete elimination of termites, the entire colony has to be killed, so this is why monitoring has to be followed until full elimination.
Non Subterranean Termites
Unlike subterranean termites that affect a large portion of the US, “non subterranean termites have been found only in a narrow strip of territory extending from central California around the southern edge of the continental United States to Virginia… and in the West Indies and Hawaii (Clausen, 2010). These termites do not multiple like subterranean ones do and they cause a lot less damage to your home. However, they are still dangerous because they do not require moisture to live. That is why in dry climates such as California and the West Indies have an issue with non subterranean termites.
Prevention
According to the University of California’s Integrated Pest Management Program, there are about four methods of preventing non subterranean termites. They are:
Chemical liquids and dust. These are chemicals applied to unpainted wood that will kill these termites when they try to eat it.
Pressure-treated wood. Pressure-treated wood is treated with a coating that not only is resistant to decay, but also termites.
Barriers (screens and paint). Barriers such as paint will act as protection from the termite being able to get to the wood.
Resistant woods. These woods are resistant to these non subterranean termites.
Treatment
In the case that these non subterranean termites have entered your home, there are some methods to treat them.
Localized treatments. The first kind of treatment is for infestations that are central or only specific to a certain location, not the entire home. There are chemical and nonchemical treatments. The chemical treatments are chemical liquids and dusts that will treat the spot that termites are eating the wood. Another chemical treatment is to use a chemical foam, which acts the same as a chemical liquid or dust application. These are both long-term treatments to ensure they won’t return.
Infestations affecting the entire home. In the case that these termites have affected the entire home, there are two methods to go about it: fumigants and heat. Fumigants is an extremely extensive solution for non subterranean termites, as it uses sulfuryl fluoride. According to University of California, it “treats all infestations simultaneously and has high levels of efficacy, if correctly applied. A monitored fumigation, which involves installing gas monitoring lines inside the structure undergoing treatment, has the highest rate of treatment success” (Lewis et al, 2014). These gas lines will kill all termites that are not in view, as this gas will spread to places that us humans wouldn’t be able to reach; that is why it is a treatment for intestations affecting the entire home. The other method is by using heat. The main benefit of this method is the absence of any chemicals in the home, which could be harmful. “The treatment process involves heating all wood in the structure to a minimum of 120°F and holding this temperature for at least 33 minutes” (Lewis et al, 2014). The negatives of both these methods, however, is that none of them have a residual effect, as they need a preventative chemical in order to achieve long term protection.
Conclusion
We all appreciate the aesthetic value and importance wood has on our homes, but it is obvious that termites are causing an important issue that needs to be resolved in our homes. Hopefully, through these methods, termites will soon become a thing of the past.