Termites on my floor - termites everywhere in building?

[OneMoreFarang]

I live in a high-rise condominium and in my apartment, and a couple of surrounding apartments, are terminates.

I rent the place and I guess sooner or later I have to move.

 

Now the question is how far do I have to move? In a way I would like to move from one floor in the building to another floor in the same building.

So to question is: How likely is it that if termites are on one floor that they will also be on another floor in the same building - maybe 5 floors up or down?

 

Is there a sure way to find out if there are termites or not? I guess if everything is painted new then maybe it looks clean but there might be termites just behind the paint, who knows?

 

And then there is a wooden desk and a drawer in my current apartment which I bought myself. Until now they look ok and they are not infested with termites. Maybe they are well impregnated.

Would it be ok to move this furniture to a new apartment? Or is it likely that there will be termites in there even if they are not visible? So if I would more I would transport the termites to a new apartment.

 

Thanks for any advice

[xylophone]

Well, termites are damn hard to get rid of once they have infested the place, however there are companies who do specialise in such things, however I'm not sure I would like to live in an apartment that had been treated to get rid of the bloody things. And then of course, there's always a chance that they have not been completely eradicated and the whole thing starts over again.

 

I've seen them do their work in Australia and here in Thailand and one particular place here in Thailand was all bar "eaten through", or at least the wooden interior of the place was, but very hard to pick it at a glance, because they tend to leave the outside shell intact so that they can go about their business eating away the insides!

 

As for your furniture, well it does depend upon what sort of furniture you have and I'm not totally sure, but if it's a melamine type covered chipboard, then you may be okay (comments from other posters on this?).

 

If it's normal wood and not a real hardwood, which they don't seem to like much, then I'm not sure that I would be moving it to another apartment.

[eyecatcher]

If you think the problem is coming from an adjacent apartment, then move because when they have had their fill there, they will move on to their next new home.

 

They may already have sent the scouts out on a recce, and that can involve going through concrete.

They are like stealth bombers and often by the time you see evidence, its too late. They can eat through a complete door frame, especially those that were never treated at the back before fixing. The paint will remain intact and you may see some evidence in that the paint is shrinking.

 

Obviously they have their favourite woods, softwoods, plywood, chipboard, plasterboard paper and the outer quadrants of hardwoods but they do turn their nose up at teak.

 

Fumigation praying is a quick fix but the chemicals are so strong you need to remove all bedding and furnishings and not even return for 21 days. (google the death hotel Chiang Mai….it was fumigated as part of a refurb, beds left in, 7 customers dead)

This spraying saturates everything, its like when the fire brigade come!!!!

 

The bad news is, it only kills those termites that are active at that time. unfortunately any eggs laid are immune to the poisons and 9 weeks later when they eventually fly out you realise they have been eating away for all that time.

 

So when you fumigate you need to follow up and chaindrite every piece of timber so that when those blighters do nibble out they kill themselves.

cost generally for a big spray will be around 5k baht but as its rented it makes more sense to leave that place behind unless you are happy to lose some of your furniture.

if you only have a few items to protect then its simply a paint brush and some chaindrite wood stain, followed up with a nice top coat finish. both products have insecticide built in. 

 

We often get the termite questions on here and you hear advice about boundary treatments, baitboxes, spraying, and everything else going.

What people are not aware of is the obvious....termites fly, they fly when the humidity is right, every flying termite is a potential king or queen and wherever they land and hook up, your roof, your fence, your garden sala, your window frame that's the start of a new colony.

so you are protected one day then vulnerable the next.

unless you stain, chaindrite, protect every piece of wood annually they are in.

 

I spent 4 months last year stripping out my house that was being attacked on  four sides aswell as the roof wall plates and all the window packers. It was plain to see which pieces of timber were selected and which were left. some new hardwood trims I bought myself three years prior were down to 25% of the original thickness.

no much evidence at the time but at night when it was quiet, the chewing of wood of 4 sides was deafening and frightening.