Recognizing Wood Damage from Pests
If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
You could have pests in your home without even realizing they exist – all the while they slowly eat away at the wood in your home. Fortunately, the type of pests that eat into wood – such as carpenter ants, termites and powder-post beetle – aren’t necessarily fast acting. You can have an infestation without your home being quickly eaten away, but you do need to take action.
How can you tell if pests are eating away at the wood in your home? They usually leave behind some distinctive signs:
- Look for holes in your wood work (window sills, baseboard, trim). These holes are really tiny – about the size of a pencil lead.
- Check for signs of recent sawdust – if you see little mounds of sawdust near or on your woodwork, that’s a big clue to pests at work.
- Look for coarse sawdust near piles of wood outside.
- Check for damage by pressing on wood work with a screw driver. Termites hollow out wood work, so damage may only be visible by pressing into their hollowed out area.
If you suspect you have carpenter ants, you may hear the ants at work. If you hear rustling in your walls, you may have a problem with carpenter ants. Termites are more visible, you will see signs of termite mounds, or you may see a swarm of termites around your home.
I recommend that you take action as soon as you think you have a problem with wood damage. I’m happy to come out to your home to check your wood work and help you determine which types of bugs are affecting your home and assess how much damage has been done, if any. Contact me at www.accuracypluscalifornia.com.
