Replies

1. 
   KeithNewton | Oct 02, 2007 04:17pm | #1

   The surest way is to use heat. Getting it up to 130º all of the way through to the middle will take care of them, and their eggs.

2. 
   ring | Oct 02, 2007 07:02pm | #2

   Kill them. Now.

   If it's a really large pile of lumber then the best way is creating a plastic tent over the whole thing and gassing them. If it's medium quantity, then there are a number of chemicals like borate that will do the job but you must be sure to get it into every single tunnel.

   David Ring

   http://www.touchwood.co.il/?id=1&lang=e

3. 
   BobSmalser | Oct 02, 2007 08:18pm | #3

   Pull a few boards and check them. If the holes are only in the sapwood with only an occasional foray into heartwood, you have one of the ambrosia beetle species that don't remain once the sugars in the sapwood are gone. The beetles bore into the logs while the bark is still on, relying on the sugars in the sapwood to develop a blue fungus their larvae feed on as they leave through the same tunnels. Once gone there won't be a reinfestation, and you can use the wood.

   If you have holes throughout the heartwood, you likely have one of the powder post species which feed on wood, and taking that wood to a proper kiln is the only way to save it. Solar contraptions and other home remedies are hit and miss.

   Next time scatter Diazinon or the modern equivalent of a persistent insecticide beneath your stacks every spring.

   “When we build, let us think that we build forever. Let it not be for present delight nor for present use alone. Let it be such work as our descendants will thank us for; and let us think...that a time is to come when those (heirlooms) will be held sacred because our hands have touched them, and that men will say, as they look upon the labor and wrought substance of them, ‘See! This our father did for us.’ “ --John Ruskin.

4. 
   KelsoChris | Oct 02, 2007 09:21pm | #4

   You can use a pump sprayer and borax laundry detergent to spray your lumber with.  I have done this in the past and not had any reinfestation isssues.  This is a good habit to do each time you have lumber sawn and everycouple of months when the wood is left outside.  I mix about a cup of detergent to one galon of water. The mixture will leave a white residue on the surface but it will not penetrate into the stock or leave a permenate discoloring.