Getting rid of termites!

[Catalina362]

Sent: 10/27/2005 1:11 AM

There is still a problem of the termites. I have tried to fumigate them but there seems to be no responce. The only hope I had was when I was running it with the cover off the engien compartment , it must have asfixiated them, because the next day there were about a hundred dead termites on the dash board and around the windows that suround the drivers compartment. Is there any thing better or perminant that I can do, other than professionaly tent it?

[denisondc]

From: denison Sent: 10/27/2005 7:07 AM

Wow; you have a new problem! I havent heard of termites in an RV before, since termites depend on having a continuous supply of moisture. We have had ants that came out a day after we started on a vacation, but they also depend on being in one location, and died out. I cant think of any other cure than tenting it, except for taking a vacation to a very dry climate for 2 or 3 weeks.

[Oz]

Sent: 10/27/2005 8:13 AM

It is most likely that you have subterranean termites (90%), but you might have dry wood termites (10%, depening on the region where you live), or they may even be a species of carpenter ant.  If they are the most common, subterranean termites, they are liking you rig because the wood is moist and easy to chew.... bad news!  You've got a lot of rotted wood, which means you've got some substantial leaks and the structural integrity of the body is in danger and, if the rig is parked close to your house, well, you've got even worse problems. 

Here is a good link on the termites and their irradication: http://www.epestsupply.com/termite_identification.htm

- Sob

[Catalina362]

Sent: 11/25/2005 1:30 AM

Thank you so much for your advice. I think from your termite site, that what I have is subteranian termites. I have fogged the interior and seen some dead termites around the front compartment.I am going to fog a few more times and hopefully that will do the trick.

[Oz]

Sent: 11/25/2005 10:18 AM

Glad to see you found the site helpful.  Lets hope they didn't do too much damage and you'll need to keep an eye out for signs of re-infestation.  Regular preventative treatment would be higly advisable.   - Sob

[Shalydra]

Not certain how applicable this will be to an rv situation but I recall a termite war from when I was a child on my grandparents farm. We had a particular outbuilding infested that was just non-responsive to fumigation for a few years - we'd knock it back a bit but it would never fully go away. We didn't have an option of abandoning this particular building nor could it be moved due to some particular plumbing.

It was however somewhat similar to an rv in that it was a wood construction encased in a metal outer shell. What we discovered was that fumigating the interior wasn't fully effective because they were sheltering in the space between the outer metal shell and the inner wood and the bug bombs were not fully penetrating into that space.

The solution was to toss up some temporary structure around the the building (bunch of 2x4's supporting cinched and overlapped tarps tacked into the surrounding ground) and then simultaneously bomb both the interior and the exterior space. We left it sealed like that for a day or so and afterwards had no further infestation for a number of years. My grandfather also loosened the metal a bit before the bombing to increase flow of the bombs into the gap-space.

No idea if the concept will hold any mileage for you but the details you mentioned (repeated interior bombings, the effect of the engine) make me think you might have a similar scenario of there being just enough fresh air getting into the outer shell to sustain em like we had back on the farm.