Archive for January, 2012

Winged pests tee off golfers – Warwick Daily News

Winged pests tee off golfers
Warwick Daily News
Hundreds of corellas fly around town and have become an unwelcome alarm clock for residents. THE white, winged creatures flying around town are no angels. In fact they seem to be causing more harm than good. Corellas have been spotted chewing on …

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 19, 2012

No Comment

Repellent to stop mozzies bugging detainees – ABC Online

Repellent to stop mozzies bugging detainees
ABC Online
By Anthea Kissel The Immigration Department says it will provide insect repellent to asylum seekers at a Darwin immigration detention facility that is prone to high levels of biting pests. Japanese gas company Inpex refused to build a workers village …

and more »

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 19, 2012

No Comment

Pest control cans blow doors off pizzeria

Fumigation vapours accidentally ignited at a Melbourne pizzeria caused an explosion that blew off the doors.

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 19, 2012

No Comment

Jan 19, 2012 – Getting To The Problem

QUESTION:

What is the best aerosol product Univar sells for wood borers that are inside antique furniture?

ANSWER:

This is a tough call, and of course I will ramble on as to why. Injecting an insecticide into wood infested with termites is more likely to control the problem, because the termites have created open tunnels that they move through on a regular basis. If you can drill a hole that enters these tunnels you can inject insecticide that the termites then will come into contact with, and hopefully even share with other termites in the colony. 

But, for beetles this is different. The beetle larva is chewing through solid wood, and getting that wood saturated with an active ingredient that the larva will contact can be difficult. For unfinished wood we can use BoraCare, as this product seems to be able to penetrate deeply into wood, carrying the borate active ingredient as it moves through. Now the solid wood is laced with a borate that will be toxic to the beetle larva that chews into that area, and the borate lasts for many years to ensure it is still there when the larva finally reaches that point. Simply drilling into the solid wood of furniture and injecting material into that wood, as the aerosol product labels state, may not put the active ingredient and the beetle larva into contact with each other. The larva fills its gallery behind itself with fecal material and does not move back and forth. The only exception to this might be Ambrosia beetles, where the female actually creates a gallery for her larvae, and these then feed on fungi that the female introduces to the gallery. 
So, I hate to be a Doubting Thomas about this, but aerosols may have a limited effect. BoraCare can be applied only to unfinished furniture, so antique furniture would likely not be a possible application for it. Even injecting aerosols could require drilling many little holes in the wood, and this could be unacceptable for fine antique furniture. The Label directions for some of the aerosol products that do list WDO beetles as a target pest can be flaky. One label lists the beetle but then gives no directions specific to that beetle. Another lists various WDO insects and then gives instructions only for termites. 
Even liquid products that could be sprayed onto infested wood are commonly labeled for WDO beetles, but spraying them onto finished antique furniture might be unacceptable. And, short of injecting these products into the wood with its limitations on effectiveness, the best you might expect from surface treating is to either kill the adult beetles as they emerge or kill the larvae that hatch from the eggs that a female has deposited in holes or crevices in that surface of the wood. Mixing a concentrate with water and applying it to wood is not going to get penetration into the wood deep enough to expect the beetle larvae to eat through it. 
If the furniture can be moved the best course of action may be fumigation, sealing it within a dedicated chamber or placing it under a tarp, and having a licensed fumigator fume it with Vikane. This is going to be fairly expensive, so the furniture needs to be worth the cost. Unfortunately the options are limited. 

View past Ask Mr. Pest Control questions.

Pest QuestionsJanuary 19, 2012

No Comment

NJ’s Jeff White puts in spotlight on Animal Planet’s ‘Infested’

Jeff White doesn’t sing, act or dance. Yet the New Egypt resident has had much more than his 15 minutes in the spotlight, appearing on “The View,” NBC’s “Today” show,” “World News Tonight with Diane Sawyer,” “Dateline …

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 18, 2012

No Comment

Hunting for the super-bug

For nearly the past decade, Pitstick, like many farmers across the country, has been relying on a genetically engineered strain of corn, called Bt corn, to fend off the corn rootworm and other . The corn is spliced with Bacillus thuringiensis …

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 18, 2012

No Comment

Moth be a way to get rid of

I have a problem with clothes moths. I called Rentokil and was assured it would be eradicated with two sprays of insecticide. I paid for three. It persisted after four, so I had to pay £200 for a carpenter to lift the floorboards for Rentokil to spray …

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 18, 2012

No Comment

Bio-pest control for carp three years away – ABC Online

Bio-pest control for carp three years away
ABC Online
The Invasive Animals CRC says it is seeking approval to release the virus within the next few years. The CRC is launching a national tour called Pest Smart of its pest control measures to date, and future plans.

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 18, 2012

No Comment

Pest Control India to turn Kanpur zoo rodent-free – Times of India

Pest Control India to turn Kanpur zoo rodent-free
Times of India
The zoo has entered into agreement with Pest Control India. The director of Kanpur zoo told TOI said that the rodents are disease carriers and often cause loss to feed given to the birds. Rodents have made veterinary hospital as home. …

and more »

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 18, 2012

No Comment

Will You Need EPA Spray Permits? – Farm Futures (blog)

Will You Need EPA Spray Permits?
Farm Futures (blog)
The PGP will cover decision makers who are required to submit notices of intent (NOI) to control pests where land resource stewardship is an integral part of an organization's operations such as a mosquito control district, a similar pest control …

and more »

View complete article

Pests in the NewsJanuary 18, 2012

No Comment

« Older Entries Newer Entries »