A long time ago, Orson Welles struck fear into the heart of many people with those very words when he aired the radio program “War of the Worlds”. He had people believing that our world was being invaded by aliens and we were set for sure destruction. Here, we are talking about a far more frightening invader than aliens —- TERMITES! Just as with “War of the Worlds”, termites can cause destruction, but the breakdown that termites can cause is far worse than anything any fictitional aliens can do because termites are real!

Termites are living, breathing, eating annoyances that every home or building owner should be worried about. They can make their way into your structure and cause devastation before you even realize its happening. That’s why, if you own property with a structure on it, you need to be diligent about termites.

You should know what they look like, what kind of damage they can inflict, and what you can do to keep them from taking over your home. I am a property owner, and, before writing this book, never really gave a second thought to termite infestation.

Now, I am constantly outside looking at the foundation of my home, in the basement inspecting the rafters, and in the yard looking for places where these little scavengers can live.

Many people are just like me – they don’t really think about termites unless they are buying a new home that requires a termite inspection. After the home is declared termite free, the home owner puts the thought of an infestation out of his or her mind and goes about life with no thought to a possible visit from these little creatures.

The truth is that you can have an infestation of termites even when your house has been declared termite free. There are a lot of reasons for this which we will get into inside the pages of this book.

Even though someone has said “You have no termites” doesn’t mean you never will which is why you need to always be aware of how to find termites and know what to do to make them go away and stay away!

Of course, you always hear the advice that you should educate yourself, and nothing could be further from the truth. When you take the time to get to know the common termite as well as know what type of damage that termite can do, you are taking the first step toward protecting your home or building. You can never have too much education for termite control that will protect your investment!

Even though termites are God’s creatures, they are devastating to the home or building owner and you must get rid of them as soon as you possibly can to protect your investment. While they are pesky little critters, some people have actually found a little humor in their work.

Famed humorist Ogden Nash is well known for his hilarious short poetry and sharp witticisms on human life. While he hasn’t written many poems to the termite, he did write one that has been studied by students in many grades and evaluated for its social relevance as well as humorous quality. His poem “The Termite” is as follows:

Some primal termite knocked on wood
And tasted it, and found it good!
And that is why you’re Cousin May
Fell through the parlor floor today.

There are basically five levels of termites: the worker, the soldier, the reproductive, the king, and the queen. Each distinctive level has its own duties when it comes to the colony. The worker termite is the lowest on the totem pole in the termite colony. They are the ones who put out the most effort with the least amount of appreciation and satisfaction in a job well done. It’s a good thing they aren’t humans or there could be an uprising! It’s especially good there’s no little termite union demanding respect for the work they do!

Worker termites have soft, light-colored bodies rarely more than 10 mm long, like grains of rice. They rarely leave the dark tunnels that run from the colony through the soil and into the wooden frames of buildings. Twenty-four hours a day, they forage for food, maintain the nest, and tend the queen and her brood. Juveniles, called nymphs, groom and feed one another and others in the colony.

The next level of the termite colony is the soldier termites. Soldier termites are the defenders of the colony – especially from ants that can come in and destroy the colony. Soldier termites have an orange colored rectangular armored head with mandibulate pinchers which they use to crush member of the ant family - their arch enemy in the insect world.

The Western subterranean termite soldier has a fontanelle (frontal gland pore or hole) on their forehead used to squirt a white sticky latex substance, mainly as a defense mechanism against ants. The soldier termite is usually the first to be seen in large numbers when any active termite workings (mud shelter tubes or damaged timber) are opened. Soldier termites will rush out to guard the opening while worker termites repair the breach.

Here is a picture of a soldier termite:

The next level of termites in the colony would be the termite alarm swarmers and are also known as the reproductives. They are commonly seen when they swarm during daylight; they have eyes; are poor fliers but are swept along by the wind. They land, drop their wings, and find a mate to become king and queen of a new termite colony.

The western subterranean termite swarmers are about 3/8″ long (including wings) with a dark brown body and a small fontanelle (frontal gland pore) on its head. Their wings are brownish grey with two dark solid veins along the forefront of the front wings. The front wing is distinctly larger than hind wing.

In the northern part of their range, swarming takes place in the spring, but without rain. In the southern areas, swarming usually follows rain. The swarmers are emitted in their thousands when a mature termite nest is large and well established.

Here is what a typical swarmer termite looks like:

At the next level in the colony are the king termites. The King termite assists the queen in creating and attending to the colony during its initial formation. He will continue to mate throughout his life to help increase the colony size.

The King’s body will range from ½” to 5/8” long and have two pairs of wings that are equal in size and shape that extend beyond their abdomen. The King termite is slightly smaller than the queen in size and is usually darker in color on the abdomen.

The Queen is the “ruler” of the colony and was once a swarmer or reproductive termite. The Queen termite creates the colony by laying eggs and tending to the colony until enough workers and nymphs are produced to care for the colony. She can live for more than ten years and produce hundreds of eggs each year. Colonies can each several million termites with the help of secondary queens who also produce eggs.

She is slightly longer in length than the King but will still measure somewhere between ½” and 5/8”. Her abdomen is lighter than the King’s and will usually be striped.

Since most people think of termites as small ants, we probably should tell you how to tell the difference between the two. Actually, ants and termites are quite different other than the fact that they are social animals. Here’s how you can tell the difference between the two.

First, ants and termites both have antennae, but the ant’s antennae are elbowed while the termite’s antennae are a simple string of bead-like segments. Ants have eyes while termites do not.

Ants have a waist that falls between the thorax and the abdomen while termites do not. The termite’s abdomen is blunt at the end, but in an ant, the abdomen is pointed at the end.

Here’s a picture of an ant and a termite side by side so that you can see the differences first hand:

Basically, termites are discovered by property owners in one of three ways. First, when a colony swarms in the first warm part of early spring, winged adults can be seen on the inside or outside of a building moving toward the light, a window, or other lit opening.

Second, as we have already said, termites build mud tubes to travel between the ground and a structure. These mud tubes can often be found on the outside of a slab between the earth and brick line, or on piers which form the foundation of a building.

Finally, because termites like to eat the paper surface of sheetrock, pin holes are left behind when sheetrock has been damaged. There also will be some tubes in the wood indicating that termites have been eating through the wood and making their way from one side of the area to the other.

You will probably rarely see any actual termites because they tend to avoid light and open air spaces. The tunnels give them the ability to go virtually undetected while reaching their food source, wood. Therefore, destruction can be “undetected” as well.

There are a few ways that termites can infest buildings. Since they like to eat damp, cellulose such as is found in wood and leaves, they will stick to where their food sources are most abundant. Your structure is probably framed in wood, but they also like drywall as well. Here are some places that allow termites to come into your home:

If there is any area of your home where water has accumulated, chances are good that termites are going to be in that area. We’ll talk about prevention later on, but just about the only way you can tell on your own if you have termites is to look for tell-tale signs that they may be around.

While we have already described the damage, you might be better served with some termite damage pictures to help you identify termite damage.

Because the evidence of termite damage cannot usually be seen by the naked eye or the untrained eye, you probably will want to employ the expertise of a professional to check for any evidence of termites and/or termite damage.

Usually, people find out they have termites when they go to buy or sell a home. Most realtors – at least responsible ones will insist on a termite inspection prior to the closing. They will call in an experienced pest control company to perform the inspection and then report on the condition of the home.

You should consult with several different companies before obtaining and inspection and get price estimates before you choose a company. If you are getting a termite inspection for a home sale or purchase, the realtor will be able to suggest some firms, but you don’t have to stick with the one that they want you to use.

Get several different price estimates and ask questions about credentials. The company and its inspectors should be members of professional organizations and be able to present you with proof of their certification. You will be spending money for an inspection, so you want someone you can trust.

A termite inspection is a visual inspection of the readily accessible areas of a home for evidence of wood-destroying insects (WDI) and wood-destroying organisms (WDO). The inspector will conduct the termite inspection by visually looking at the entire interior of a home (including accessing and entering any sub-space such as basements and crawlspaces) and exterior of the property.

In areas where drywood termites are prevalent, and in houses where there are no sub-areas, the attic may also be accessed and inspected during a termite inspection.

After the termite inspection has been performed, the findings are reported on the applicable/appropriate form. The average termite inspection takes approximately 30 to 45 minutes for a thorough inspection, depending on the size and conditions (e.g. clutter; storage of personal items, etc.) of the home and property.

You want your inspector to be thorough during the termite inspection and be able to identify any existing damage as well as check for any possible future damage, so be patient with them and take heed of any findings.

The inspector should be very thorough, and whoever you choose should be fully licensed, certified, and insured. He or she will present you with a thorough report on anything that they find on the appropriate forms.

They may also give you a suggested route of treatment or prevention depending on what they find. Since most termite inspectors work for pest control companies, they know how to most effectively treat the problem.

Once you get a termite inspection, it might be a good idea to get a second opinion – especially if the estimate is higher than you think it should be. There are a lot of companies and inspectors out there who will try to pad an estimate so that they can make more money off of treatment. That makes them fraudulent, and they are out there more than you can know.

Take a look at your original list of estimates and choose another company to come out and inspect the property. Of course, when you get a second opinion, you will have to pay for it too, but if you are looking at a huge treatment estimate, spending that extra couple of hundred dollars can be well worth the investment.

So you’ve found out that you have termites – now what? Well, aside from screaming in agony and crying your eyes out, first, get hold of your emotions and realize that this is not a problem that can’t be solved. Now, you need to get treatment.

Here is an example of termite damage to a floor joist. Note the burrowing tunnels as this is typically indicative of the presence of termites.

In the following picture, you will not only see the burrowing holes, but you can also see the pinpoint holes where the termites have entered the wood.

Here is another more extensive termite damage visual.

As you can see, the damage that termites can cause could be quite extensive. If the infestation is left to continue, it can cause thousands of dollars of damage to a structure and even completely destroy a home beyond repair.

Some estimates place the annual damage to homes at over $500,000. Others say it is well over a million dollars. Most of the worst termite damage is located in the Southeast portion of the United States as well as arid savannah regions in places like Africa and Australia.

It doesn’t matter where you’re located, termite damage can be utterly devastating for the homeowner. It is true that the worst damage can take years to cause problems, but still, that damage can cause a home to become unsafe to live in.

One woman tells us that she had no idea about the amount of damage a termite can do. She never even thought about it until she felt a floorboard that was loose. She went outside and saw a swarm of bugs around the foundation of her house, and she began to do some research.

A pest control company was called in and she found out that she did, indeed, have a termite infestation. What surprised the most was when the termite inspector showed her the amount of damage that a termite could do as she looked into the hole the inspector had cut into her wall. She was amazed and shocked.

Not only will termite damage cause a structure to be unstable, it can – and, if left untreated – even cause the structure to collapse around you. It’s frightening when you think about it.

Those worker termites get inside your home and start burrowing through the studs, the door frames, and the drywall of your home.

They gnaw through the material your home is made of and make trails through the wood that can weaken the wood itself causing problems with the integrity of the wood.

The amount of damage a termite can do is multiplied by the fact that there is more than one termite working on the wood. They work together to get food for the colony and thus cause a huge amount of damage to your structure.

That is why it is so important to pay attention to what is going on around your home and always check for signs of termite damage. Many people don’t do this. They just sit around hoping that their home is safe.

Repairing a home that has termite damage is no easy proposition. There are times when just a few beams in the ceiling need to be replaced. Then there are other times when whole walls need to be reconstructed. In extreme situations, the structure must be condemned and torn down.

The first step towards saving your home is to educate yourself. Do a lot of research and know what to look for when you are looking for evidence of termites in your home. Search the internet, read this book over and over again. Do whatever you have to do, but make sure you know that termites can do a huge amount of damage and cause you to lose your home.

First, don’t feed them. Whether you know it or not, by having certain conditions present in and around your house, you are giving the termites a food source that will sustain the colony and keep them reproducing making more and more termites that will damage your home.

Keep your gutters clean. Wet leaves provide moisture and food for the pests, and since the gutters are attached to your home, it’s an easy point of entry. Clogged gutters can also contribute to moisture problems by soaking wood off the roof and fascia boards.

Wood piles and construction debris, boards left touching the ground or fences without proper ground clearance can all be food sources. Cardboard is also a favorite food of termites and damp cardboard around or under a house could provide an ideal opportunity for termites.

Building a deck? Make concrete barriers part of your plan and be sure to use borate-treated, pressurized wood. The USDA’s Forest Service has a bulletin on subterranean termites with helpful hints on construction practices.

Your contractor may also have suggestions for preventing termite infestations. Stucco facades extending near or into the soil surface provide a haven for termites, allowing them to move into a home undetected.

Termites love moisture which is why they feed on damp wood. Make sure the air conditioner tank is at least four inches from your house. Don’t let it leak near your house. Dryers should vent away from the house — the warm air is moisture-saturated from dried clothes. Washers should drain away from the house, too.
Check for leaky faucets and make fixing them a priority. Flat roofs are a bad idea; they harbor moisture and invite infestation.

Summer sprinkler play is fun for kids, but make sure the faucet is turned off –tightly — after the water games are finished. Insulation around pipes should not extend all the way from the house to the soil. After cold spells are over, the insulation should be removed or at least have a gap large enough to allow homeowners to detect termites.

Check around the pipes in your home to make sure that there is no water leaking underneath the house. Pools of water can accumulate in the crawl space which is a breeding ground for termites – especially subterranean termites that live in the soil.

Make sure their access to the home is limited. Keep vines, flower gardens and storage containers away from your house. Make a garden path if you must have them close by. Their roots feed the termites, and the leaves give the termites the moisture and shade they crave. Also, you won’t be able to see the clay tubes the termites make to sneak into your home.

Check your house for stains, holes and other infestation signs. Wings on your window sill, particularly inside the house, are a sign that you need to have your home checked; don’t just hope the problem will go away.

Look closely at the foundation of your home and check for any cracks in the concrete. These are great places for termites to enter your home since they are so small. Any cracks should be sealed with a waterproof sealant that will make entry through these cracks impossible.

Keep all scrap wood away from your house. A wood pile for a fireplace is a haven for termites and they love to live in and around any scrap wood that is strewn about.

When it rains, they do little termite dances as it makes the wood much easier to eat. If the wood is close to your house, they may be tempted to take a vacation from the woodpile and move onto your home for a change of pace.

Make sure that all guttering downspouts point rainwater to drain away from your house. You don’t want the water to butt up against your home and make the wood wet.

Any wood that is touching both the ground and your house is a threat. Eliminate all earth-to-wood contact in the structure, including scrap wood, fence posts, trellises, shrubbery or tree branches that come in contact with the house.

Keep the area around the foundation or piers of your house clear of wood debris; a piece of wood or a ladder leaning against the house can provide a termite entrance.

Don’t build bridges for termites. Make sure that gardens don’t mound new dirt over treated soil next to the foundation or piers. Avoid using mulch in gardens next to the house. Mulch is just wood chips and when it gets wet, it’s a buffet for your local termites.

And, believe it or not, outdoor lights with white bulbs may attract night swarming termites, especially in the spring. Try replacing white bulbs with yellow or pale amber.

There are some advancement that is being made in the detection of termites and termite colonies in structures and homes. Actually, it is technology that has been around for awhile but is just now being used in the detection of termites.

Because of dehydration, ground termites die rather quickly when exposed to the environment due to their thin exoskeleton. To maintain the needed humidity and protect them from predators they build protective mud tubes and remain unseen most of the time.

These pests also produce a chemical odor called a pheromone, which other termites, in the colony follow to find food and water.

We spoke earlier about where ground termites live. They construct mud tubes to live in, and many of those tubes can be quite impressive. These tubes extend over foundation walls, support piers, sill plates, floor joists, etc. They can also stand alone. The mud tubes are typically about the diameter of a pencil, but sometimes can be thicker and much, much larger.

Termites construct these tubes for shelter as they travel between their underground colonies and the structure. To help determine if an infestation is active, the tubes may be broken open and checked for the presence of small, creamy-white worker termites.

If a tube happens to be vacant, it does not necessarily mean that the infestation is inactive; termites often abandon sections of tube while foraging elsewhere in the structure. But if you do find mud tubes, you probably have termites.

This is what a typical termite mud tube will look like around your home:

In some places of the world, termite mud tubes are quite large and amazing structures. Check out some of these gigantic mud tubes:

Cathedral Mounds in Australia

More cathedral mounds in Northern Africa

So, you know that if you have mud tubes present around your foundation or even on your walls, chances are very good that you have termites. But what else should you look for when trying to determine if you have termites?

If you have a particularly bad termite problem, the exterminator may suggest that you have a tent fumigation done. This is for bad infestations that extend throughout the structure, and it is probably the most radical of all termite treatments.

With tent fumigation, you will be required to leave your home for a minimum of three days. The chemicals that the company uses are strong although they won’t cause damage to anything in your home except for exposed food.

There are some preparations you will need to go through to get ready for the tenting. You may want to ask your pest control operator specifically what you need to do before they come, but here is a general list of guidelines:

Your fumigator may ask that other things be done prior to tenting, so be sure to ask them prior to the procedure. They will probably provide you with a sheet indicating they have advised you of the preparations.

They will also probably give you an information about the specific gas they will be using and ask you to sign a piece of paper that acknowledges you have been advised of all this.

The first day of fumigation, your home is covered with a tent or tarp. The idea of this is to make sure that the gas they use stays inside the structure and that all areas of the home will be treated with the gas. Here’s what a tented home looks like on day 1:

After the home is covered with the tent, Vikane gas or some other type of chemical is sent inside the home and circulated with fans placed throughout the home. The purpose of the fans is to move the gas throughout the home so that all areas are covered and treated.

The property is then left alone for the gas to work through and kill the termites. Since Vikane is odorless, chloropicrin (tear gas) is added as a warning agent. Warning signs are also posted around the perimeter of the tent.

Day 2 is when the tent is removed from the home and the gas is released. All the windows and doors will be opened and the fans will still run so that all the gas is taken out of the structure.

In pure form, the gas can be lethal to breathe in, but when the home is aired out, the level of gas can be brought down to levels that have been found to cause no harm to animals or humans.

On the third day, the inspectors will come in with special measuring instruments to measure the level of gas in the air and determine whether or not it is safe for you to come back in the home. They will do another visual inspection to make sure that all live termites have been eradicated that were inside the structure.

They will provide you with a certification form showing that your home is termite free and then give you suggestions as to how to prevent an infestation from happening again.

While the tenting will kill all live termites, however, subterranean termites are in the soil and the gas won’t be able to reach and kill them. That’s why a prevention plan is so important because you want to avoid re-infestation by the presence of these bugs.

The gas will not kill the termite eggs. Vikane is not an ovicide, meaning it will not kill the insect eggs. However, in the case of termites, even if the eggs hatch, the baby termite will eventually die because there are no worker termites to feed them.

If the target pest is drywood termites, the concentration of Vikane gas will be very specific to the required dosage for drywood termites. However, even at this dosage, Vikane will kill many other insects like cockroaches, silverfish, ants, even rats and mice.
You may continue to see evidence of termite droppings around your home. Though fumigation kills all termites inside the house, the droppings will still be inside the termite galleries or tunnels inside the wood.

Through constant movement of the house, for example, doors closing hard, natural movements, and the gravitational pull, you will still see termite droppings occasionally.

You will be allowed back into your home after the certification process is completed on the third day. The gas won’t harm anything in your home such as furniture, etc.
You may want to wash down cabinets and countertops, but this isn’t really necessary as Vikane gas will not stick to any surface because of its non-residual properties. Many people do this anyway for their own piece of mind anyway.

Tenting, however, isn’t always necessary to treat for termites. You can also have other treatments done to get rid of your termites. Most of these procedures are also used as preventative measures when you are trying to keep termites from infesting your home. You may want to consider other methods of treating termites, such as Chemical treatment.

During Construction

Ideally, the best time to treat for termites is before the home is constructed or during the construction. If you use pre-treated wood that has been sprayed with a chemical like Timbor, you will have less chance of termites.

After the footings are poured and the foundational walls and/or piers have been constructed, apply the termiticide to a trench in the soil about 12 inches wide and 6 inches deep adjacent to the foundation.
Soil on both sides of the exposed foundational walls and soil surrounding should be soaked down to the foundation footing at the labeled rate. Apply at the diluted rate.

Poured in with a watering can or bucket is easier than using a sprayer. There is no need to dig the trench any deeper than the top of the footing. Soil at the bottom of the trench can be loosened with a spade or iron bar to allow further penetration.

For outside basement walls (where the footing is deep) most pest control operators apply the chemical by injecting it along the foundation through a hollow rod attached at the end of the hose in place of a soil nozzle. This is called “rodding”. The result is a continuous chemical barrier from footing to surface.

This should be applied to both the inside and outside of the foundation and also around piers, chimney bases, pipes, conduits, and other structures in contact to the soil. Use at the rate of 4 gallons per 10 linear feet. The diluted termiticide should be mixed in with the soil, as it replaced.

For effective pretreatment termite proofing, much of the chemical barrier needs to put under the concrete slabs. Obviously it is easier to put out the barrier termite treatment BEFORE a slab has been poured.

After it has been poured, it will need to be drilled and a chemical injected under the slab to seal off termite entry points. This is not a “do it yourself project”. Apply a diluted termiticide at the rate of 1 gallon per 10 sq. feet, covering the square footage.

Along both sides of the foundational walls and interior foundational walls and plumbing, apply this diluted rate at the rate of 4 gallons per 10 linear feet. A hose end sprayer hooked up to your sprayer, makes this job a lot easier.
It is also possible to do a termite treatment yourself on a house that is already built.

Post-Construction Treatment

A thorough inspection is the first and most important step. Basement construction may require treatment which injects termiticides into the soil through holes drilled in the basement floor at regular intervals.

Crawl space treatment also involves trenching or rodding soil along the foundation walls and around piers and pipes, then applying termiticides to the soil.

Dig narrow trenches along both the inside and outside of foundation walls and around piers and chimney bases, applied at the rate of 4 gallons per 10 linear feet. Also be sure to trench and treat around sewer pipes, conduits and all other structural members in contact with the soil. The trench should be as deep as the top of the footing.

Mix the termiticide with the soil as it is replaced. The State regulations differ state to state on treatment and drilling activity required.

You will want to be sure and do what you can to treat inside the walls. You can do this from the attic or basement or choose to drill a small hole in a hidden place and inject the chemicals in that way.

There are a lot of people in the world who are concerned with the environment and want to prevent termites from infesting their home without the use of chemicals of any type. Is there such a thing as natural termite treatment?