Woodworm
By far the most common sign of woodworm in a piece of timber are small holes in the wood itself. These are usually pinpricked sized holes, often looking as if the wood was used as the backdrop for a dartboard.
If there is a light powder around the holes themselves, this is often as a sign of a live infestation (that is, that the woodworm are still present and active within the wood itself). This powder – known as frass – is actually the faeces given up by the larvae as they eat into the wood.
Another sign of a woodworm infestation is live adult beetles found indoors, though this will only be obvious during the summer months, once they have completed their larval cycle.
In their natural habitat, adult beetles lay their eggs on the surface of (or just below) a piece wood. Once those eggs hatch, the grubs will feed on the wood until ready to pupate and change into adult beetles, which will then go through the whole process again.
In the wild, the wood these grubs eat has a far higher moisture content than dried and prepared timbers used in house construction, so an infestation of woodworm is usually a good signifier of damp in the wood, which brings its own problems.
Indeed, some species of woodworm – the larvae of the woodboring weevil, for instance – only eat wood that has already started to rot.
Our first task, at Essex Preservations will be to inspect the wood itself and determine if it is a live infestation. Once done, we can decide on the most effective way to exterminate them. Our timber preservation engineers are experts in the field, and deliver an ideal solution to your problem, whether it be weevils in Westcliff or ambrosia beetle in Southend.
