Powder post beetles

SHALER

Member
I purchased some boric acid wood treatment for powder post beetles. Its a powder you mix with water and then spray on. Situation: 100 year old bank barn. Hay storage on top. Machinery parked in the bottom. The machinery has a fine dust on it that is from the beetles. Therefore I would like to spray the ceiling (or the underside of the barn floor). Has anyone used a spray treatment like this on a ceiling? Just wondering if it requires some high pressure deal, or if a handheld sprayer or 12V ATV sprayer with a wand would work to apply the spray to the ceiling.
 
Powder post beetles can only exist when the wood is wet. Mostly hardwoods.

Powder indicates the larva are active. The beetles only exist for a short time. The larva does the damage and can live for a very long time in wet wood.

I can't remember what power my termite guy sold me. You mix it with water and apply it to the holes to kill the larva. Good luck.
 
The chemical you spray you will have to get the wood wet enough to soak into it. I used to have to treat furniture from Europe infested with them but I was supplied with the bug spray which came from France. Never knew what it was.
 
Whatever 'treatment' you choose, it may be too late. If you consider the amount of 'powder/sawdust' visible, the structural integrity may already have been compromised. I wish you the best. Regular 'insect spray' - rattle cans, will deal with the critters but may not save your bldg. ;(
 
It's been 20+ years since I was up-to-date on current methods of dealing with powder post beetles. Back then, there were ONLY 2 options, short of destroying the wood. One was to take a poison and squirt it into each and every hole. Problems with that are, sometimes you miss the correct hole, and sometimes the poison doesn't get through to the intended because it gets soaked up into the wood and wood dust.

The other method was to heat the wood. Seems like the wood had to heat to 120F, but I cannot remember how many hours it needed to stay at that temperature. Doing that will kill off any active borers as well as any unhatched eggs.

Boric acid might work to help prevent future infestations, but I doubt it will do anything to the current pests.
 
Timbor is the product I use...and yes you can use the 12 volt sprayer or hand pump sparyer. Mix the product until completely dissolved and coat under side of ceiling till dripping. I use it in my crawl space with this method, works well. Will not kill the grub inside the wood until they come out but will prevent beetles from laying in the wood again.
 
I got tim bor from my termite guy go kill power post beetles. Need to fill holes to kill larva.
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