Woodworm - advice needed.

[Andy in Sig]

I just noticed a little mound of sawdust at the base of one of the legs of my dining table which is made of oak. Half way up the leg was a neat little hole about 2mm in diameter. An unbent paperclip went in and downwards for about 1 cm. I guessed woodworm which I believe are beetle larvae and blasted the hole close up with fly spray. What other measures can I take e.g. would glueing up the hole help?

 

[sheddy]

No idea, but get it out of the house before it spreads...

 

[Willow]

get it out the house and get rentokil in is my advice. We had that with brand new garden furniture about 10 years ago. Arrived, we oiled it then went away for the weekend got back and it was full of holes. It was sent back pdq. My hubby even through out the wooden tray that had been on it - always excessively cautious!

 

[Night Train]

If it is only one hole then you may be ok if it has 'flown the nest'. The hole is where the adult escapes and flies off. If you see holes then there is usually no larvae present so treatment in that hole is a bit like bolting the stable door after the horse has bolted.

The larvae will only eat the sap wood of the oak, the lighter area of the timber that is the outer living part of the tree trunk. The sap wood contains sugars that the larvae feeds on whereas the heart wood is old growth that no longer grows and so has no sugars in it. Very expensive furniture is usually made without any sapwood to make it more hardy against bug attack but that 'wastes' a lot of the tree, about 50%, and so isn't done much nowadays.

It is worth keeping an eye out for any other little piles of dust around the house as soft woods used in construction is very palatable for the little buggers.

 

[Lardyboy]

If it is only one hole then you may be ok if it has 'flown the nest'. The hole is where the adult escapes and flies off. If you see holes then there is usually no larvae present so treatment in that hole is a bit like bolting the stable door after the horse has bolted.

The larvae will only eat the sap wood of the oak, the lighter area of the timber that is the outer living part of the tree trunk. The sap wood contains sugars that the larvae feeds on whereas the heart wood is old growth that no longer grows and so has no sugars in it. Very expensive furniture is usually made without any sapwood to make it more hardy against bug attack but that 'wastes' a lot of the tree, about 50%, and so isn't done much nowadays.

It is worth keeping an eye out for any other little piles of dust around the house as soft woods used in construction is very palatable for the little buggers.

An excellent explanation NT.

Don't be alarmed if you've only got a "small" number of flight holes. Treat them with WW killer and any that are left in there will get a dose and will eventually die off. Keep vigilant though, as NT says keep looking for fresh piles of saw dust, and treat the piece of furniture again. Bear in mind that the most common type of woodworm, the common furniture beetle, has a 3 or 4 year life cycle, so it could be in the timber for a long time before it emerges.

It's worth pointing out that Westminster Abbey has had a Death Watch Beetle infestation for years. They bore a hole up to 4-6mm.

 

[Night Train]

Death Watch Beetle is really impressive to see. At college we found one in an ash board that was being ripped, it was a good 13-14mm long and left huge hidden tunnels in the board.

 

[longers]

Is that the larvae of the DWB?

Is there a Knocking noise associated with them?

 

[hubgearfreak]

Is there a Knocking noise associated with them?

yes

but they can't eat dry wood. so you only need to worry about the rest of the house if you've got damp

 

[longers]

Cheers HGF, I was going to look there.

I remember being told as a kid about the knocking but hadn't thought about it till now. From that article I infer that the beetles and the larvae chew your woodwork.

Nice!

 

[hubgearfreak]

but without damp, they're all fooberred

However, if you keep timber "dry" and "below 12% moisture content" you will certainly not get wet rot or dry rot and common furniture beetle would prefer a slightly higher moisture content. There are of course many different types of woodworm, each one requiring different conditions.

from here

when did you last check the flow through the airbricks around the base of the house? my cavity was 2 or 3 feet deep in old mortar and sand so making airbricks useless and bridging the DPC. no wonder the floors are all shagged

 

[Globalti]

If you buy a can of woodworm treatment, keep your eyes averted when you stick the little nozzle in the hole and squirt because sometimes it re-emerges from another hole!

 

[Paulus]

As a precaution I would check your floorboards and skirtingboards for infestation just to see if there are any more of the buggers about. Also the cupboard under the stairs if you have one.

 

[Andy in Sig]

The skirting is brand new and the floors are of cement (under floor heating) so I think it is not an issue. It is interesting that they are in the wood for a couple of years before emerging. I noticed that the table leg in question in made up of three lengths of timber joined together so if I am lucky it is only one part of one leg that is affected. I'm just going to do daily checks from now on.

Does anybody know if the time they emerge is seasonal i.e. this time of year?

 

[Lardyboy]

The skirting is brand new and the floors are of cement (under floor heating) so I think it is not an issue. It is interesting that they are in the wood for a couple of years before emerging. I noticed that the table leg in question in made up of three lengths of timber joined together so if I am lucky it is only one part of one leg that is affected. I'm just going to do daily checks from now on.

Does anybody know if the time they emerge is seasonal i.e. this time of year?

It could be that the timber was attacked whilst it was still a tree so to speak, so depending on how old the piece of timber before it was used in the furniture.

Being made up of "laminted" timber might be an issue as one of the "laminates" might be more "sappy" and softer than the others and the beetle can attack this much easier. Also depends on what glue is used to stick them together. Not so much an issue these days, but if you've got any furniture, or joinery work, over 60/70 years old its probably being held together with "animal" glue which all the types of woodworm love to munch on.

As for seasonal, they aren't. They can appear at any time, though they will slow down in the cold.

 

[Andy in Sig]

The table is quite new and made up of pieces of solid oak. The legs came delivered in cardboard boxes which suggests to me that the thing got in at the joinery or even earlier as you suggest.