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All righty, welcome back to CPL pest controls podcast channel. I’m your host, Chris Villarreal, president of CPL, pest control, Houston location. And coming to you today with a new episode on Houston Termites. And so as we creep closer to the swarming season, want to go over some things that you want to be on the lookout for, you know, with your home or place of business, or even apartment, termites are non discriminant, they will eat just about any place that has wood, a food source for them. And so what I want to go over in this little podcast episode is just briefly what types of termites we deal with here in southeast Texas, and what you as a homeowner need to look out for this season, as we get ready for the swarming season. So as we get started, so Southeast Texas, we have three major species of termites in our area that are native to our area, those being subterranean for Mosa. And dry wood termites, your subterranean, and for most in termites are going to bear a similar characteristics, both both in nature and how they come in contact with your structure and how they come in contact with you. Whereas your dry, what’s going to be a little different. So your sub training and your promotion are gonna are going to originate in the soil, your subterranean termite needs to go back and forth from the soil source, and up, up and down. And so what will happen is, is the queen will send out workers to go to a food source and extract the food source, bringing back feed the reproducers, the King, the Queen, and the soldiers. And so in doing so you could have a problem there in your house. And a lot of the times a lot of homeowners don’t know what to look for. So what are you looking for, for a subterranean termite issue. So what what you want to look for is mud on the outside of the house. So subterranean termites will connect from the surface to your structure, and use a mud tube. And that mud tube is to shield them from the elements, the elements being, you know, the air, oxygen, the heat so forth, termites have a very weak and weak endoskeleton. And so their skeleton can can vaporize relatively quickly, they can dehydrate relatively quickly. So very important that they stay shielded. So with that being said, that’s what you want to look for, you want to look for little mud tubes connecting this surface to soil, if you will, to the structure. And a lot of the times, you know, when you knock down one of those little toddlers, you can see the termite soldiers, or I’m sorry, the termite workers going back and forth using those tunnels. And just something you want to be on the lookout for now, for most Termites will start the same way, they’ll start in the soil. But what makes them different is after they’ve established their colony inside the home, they no longer need the soil source. So what we’ve seen happen in the past is we’ve seen situations where there is no mud tube on the outside, whether once upon a time was a mud tube on the outside connecting those termites from the soil to the structure. But because of time, the mud tube is no longer there because the mud tube is no longer there. There’s no evidence of them until it becomes a little too late for the Formosan termite issue. For most of termites can consuming an extreme amount of wood in a short period of time. I cannot stress how important it is to have at least annual termite inspections done once a year to make sure you don’t have any of these three majors you know species of termites but specifically your for most in your for Mosaic can do a considerable amount of damage in so you’re looking for the same thing but what you’re looking for on the inside at that point. You know, once they’ve already disconnected from the from the surf from the soil and no longer need the soil anymore. You’re looking for evidence on the inside. So what does that look like you’re looking for? What would be the equivalent of a kind of like a cast of a carton inside your wall. So a lot of the time that curtain will balloon itself outside of the wall and it almost looks like your wall has a ball that’s not caused by moisture. But it’s, you know, the actual termite carton, of course, you’re looking for termite damage, which is relatively easy to spot. And so that’s what you’re looking for when you’re looking for subterranean. And for most termites, your dry wood, termites are going to bear different characteristics. And just for sake of time, we’ll go over those in more detail in a later podcast. But what you’re looking for, for evidence of dry wood termites is you’re looking for a fresh, fresh is just a fancy word for termite excrement. And what they do is that dry wood, termites will kick that frass outside of their termite galleries, and push it out of what we call termite kickout holes, and they’ll kick that stuff out, and it’ll fall out to the ground. And so a lot of lot of people you know, will kind of sweep it up, think nothing of it. But then think something of it, once they see it, you know, established by a pattern, you know, you know, seeing it every day, you’re seeing it every other day, or you know, once a week or so forth. And so that is kind of what you’re looking for, with dry wood termites. But if you don’t know what you’re looking for, and you don’t want to take the risk, we strongly encourage you to call, if not a CPL, pest control, some termite company to go out and give you a free inspection. Most companies wouldn’t charge you a dime to do an inspection. You want to make sure that you have a professional come out and take a look at your home to see any vulnerabilities in see if your home does have a problem. You don’t want your most valuable asset, being eaten up by something that can be eliminated, relatively easy. Give us a call today to 816836737 Now I want you to do this, I want you to ask to speak with Chris, this is gonna give you a free promotion if there is a problem. This lets me know that you listen to this podcast and just kind of, you know encourages us button but but most importantly, lets me know that you already have a basic understanding of termite. So give us a call today. Remember, that’s 281-683-6737 I look forward to listening to you and talking to you.
