Thread: Grrrr! Dirty stinking wood thieves!

Yeah, Mikm, looks like a Lyctus alright. The little beasts can trash a piece of wood in short order when they take a liking to it. Rotten little bleeders!

Did you seal the end-grain asap? Or were the logs cut & left unsealed for a while before you sawed them? They have a pretty long lifecycle, so it is likely you had an infestation when you sawed up, & these are the emerging adults....

Cheers

Hi Ian.
The tree was slabbed almost immediately, but I didn't get my hands on any of it until after it had been left stacked (unstickered) in the open for a month or so. The end grain was painted when the tree was dropped, though.

Do we have any favourite extermination techinques? I don't really want to bomb the stuff with pesticides. I read somewhere years ago that, while tedious, injecting something like turps into the holes would sort them out....

Mikm - I thought sealing end-grain was pretty good at stopping them, but I guess they can find spots on the side grain to start their dirty work.

Lyctids like sapwood, so cutting-off (& burning!) all sapwood should see them off. They also prefer the MC >10%, so getting it below that will slow 'em down. Insecticides aren't a very attractive alternative - quite apart from the thought of filling your wood with chemicals, it's just plain hard to get at 'em that way.

Thermal treatment is good on small bits - they can't cop freezing. For larger amounts, I have successfully killed off everything by putting the wood in a sealed black plastic bag (well stickered so the air can get round every bit) & leaving in full sun for a week. Make sure your wood is pretty dry, or you might end up with matchsticks! The first time I did this I was following advice from someone else, & included a couple of those vapour pest-strips. But I reasoned that heat alone will do it, if the temp gets above 60 degrees (which it can easily do) for any length of time. So I tried that (once) & it seemed to work just as well.

As I said, though - you may not need any further treatment, if you get rid of any residual sapwood. These days I avoid sapwood on species that I know are vulnerable, and if I do find borers of any sort in wood I tend to send it to the fire unless it's really valuable stuff.

Cheers,
(PS. Her's the CSIRO words of wisdom on wood-eating critters:
http://www.csiro.au/resources/WoodBo..._pageNo-3.html
)

Thanks Ian. That CSIRO link was a good read.

Thanks for the bodgy macro idea, tried it out with my new DSLR, didn't get the focus quite right (any tips?) but I will 'endeaver to persevere'...

Probably another wood chomper but this one was easy, not moving about much as it was dead!
Mark

Well, I took another look at some of the oak I had hoped to save today and found what I assume is a juvenile. I had dripped turps into all visible holes (hoping capillary action would flood the tubes) and also marked them with a pencil when I first discovered borer, but had another look today to find this bloke crawling around.

I didn't find any more holes than the ones already marked, but it looks like I'm going to have to come up with a plan B. Perhaps along the lines of temperature as suggested by Ian.

Sorry Mark, I remember reading your post when you typed it but got side tracked before replying. Focusing tends to be a bit hit an miss with my set up. Steady hands and some sort of support are useful given how short the depth of field is. Failing that, just take heaps of shots and in between all of the camera movement, some of them will be focused where you want them. Using servo rather than one-shot focus should be of assistance, too.

Mikm - Thanks for the tips, I will have to find some more critters to practice on.
Mark

bloody little bugers what i tend to use is a mix of turps and citronella oil that stops the bugers

troy

No worries, Mark.
What sort of proportions do you use, Troy? Do you just paint it on or inject into holes? Had any residue/contamination problems when applying finishes to previously treated wood?

Originally Posted by mikm

What sort of proportions do you use, Troy? Do you just paint it on or inject into holes? Had any residue/contamination problems when applying finishes to previously treated wood?

um normally use a small watering can turps 70 % citronella 30 % and just lighlt pour over the logs / boards if i know im going to use it for food item its turps only

troy

might have to give that a try.
thanks mate

Well, recycling is all the rage these days. When I discovered that a stack of freshly cut cherry was full of larvae under the bark, I just debarked the lot, sweeped up the dust they had made attacking the sapwood and passed it through a sieve. I had enough maggots to feed the goldfish in the pond for a couple of weeks!
These did not have enough time to burrow deeply, but have no idea of how many have contaminated the rest of the stash.