When it comes to defending your home from termites you have to take it seriously. Those little disturbing insects will eat your home throughout if you are not careful.
Luckily, in our modern world there are many methods of killing those parasites. Powders, termite wood repellents or even full anti-pesticide quarantine enclosure of property.
Although as insecticides are, basically, poison in different forms you have to as careful as it is possible with it. Wearing full eye, nose, ear protection, rubber gloves etc.
Also, when the parasite problem is present you have to know what method, way and which manner would you choose to clean your surroundings from all the dangerous termites and other parasites.
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- Pros and cons
- Termite repellent products
- When can you depend on repellents?
- Are repellents toxic?
- Useful articles
- Conclusion
The article you are about to read will tell you more about termite repellents, how to choose and use them, and who do they affect. These are the most important things you need to know before arming yourself up.
If you don’t have any problems with parasites infesting your house it is still a good thing to read about it, as it may affect everyone at any point, especially if some unique conditions are met. So prepare to read and you will surely know what to do and how to use termite repellents efficiently and without harm to you and your family.Pros and cons
First of all, before doing anything you have to understand what you are dealing with. What kind of termites, where do they live, how many of them are there, how many eggs there are.
When this is done, you can do 2 things.
The first one is dealing with the problem yourself.
Alternatively, you may call for help of anti-parasite company, and they will discuss all the problems from the bottom to the top.
They can even do everything for you, but you will probably have to vacate the house for a limited period of time. So, when using insecticides, you are faced with some pros and cons. Pros are:
- Using termite repellent is easy.
- Not that hard to make on your own, if you want to.
- Mostly not harmless.
But the cons really weight it out by a big margin:
- If the infestation is too large, termite repellents won’t probably do much, as to kill of a large amount of insects you have to “dig inside”…
- If made incorrectly, sometimes can’ even work.
- Without full identification of the problem the repellent may not fit your problem, which doesn’t go for other methods of fighting with termites.
- Not as beneficial, as using expensive but effective commercially sold pesticides.
So as you can see termite repellents currently are not the best alternative, and you would better off buy powder or wet termicides and such.Here you can learn more information about effective termite control remedies: Bora-Care, Boric acid, Borate, Fipronil, Chlorpyrifos, Chlordane, Borax, Timbor, Termidor, Terminator, Phantom, Lorsban, Biflex, Terro. You can choose different forms, such as – foam, liquid, powder.
Termite repellent products
Termite repellents can be distributed into 2 main groups.
Natural termite repellents. Consist of ingredients that can be naturally found in the environment/made from natural products.
Mostly much safer than unnatural repellents, but are vastly less efficient and don’t work as good. But they are much cheaper and are a good alternative if your infestation isn’t too large.
So it’s best to use for wooden termites when you know where their nest is and you are sure that it’s not too large. For example, not deep wooden wall, especially good outside in the garden. As well as this, they can easily be made at home without too much hustle.
Though it is best to ask someone from pesticide-control about what you should be using, and can you use homemade means of killing termites.
Examples of organic termite repellents are: neem tree and orange oils, wet cardboard as traps, small anti-parasite worms called “nematodes”, mulch for attracting them (good when using with unnatural repellents to finish insects off) and many other.Unnatural termite repellents, mostly made from chemical ingredients that might harm your pets, yourself and anyone else, but as a trade off are extremely efficient and expensive. That doesn’t necessarily mean that you don’t have to know how to use them, and they will work.
You need to understand at least the basics, otherwise you won’t do much. So it’s best to discuss the use of unnatural repellents with pesticide-control. For some their high price might be a problem – though you don’t need much to kill off a large infestation, particularly if you know what to do.
Also, this is the main thing that specialists use from their practice. They can be used everywhere where natural repellents don’t work. So, they work for large wood and ground nests, To find unnatural repellents, you can just look at the shop’ counter. There you will find chemical-based insecticides. Ortho, Termidor and else.
Here you can learn more information about termite bait systems: Advance, Green, CSIRO, Nemesis, Exterra, Firstline, Terminate. Also find out how to make baits by yourself and how to refill them?
When can you depend on repellents?
Repellents work most of the time, specifically unnatural ones. The only times when the don’t work are either incorrect use of them, or the vastness of infestation. As such, there are only a couple of things you can do. In the first case, just learn to use repellents correctly, maybe consult a specialist.
The second case is much worse. You should definitely speak to pest-control, maybe even ask them to deal with the problem, as it will only become larger, give you exponentially more material damage every day until you might even have to abandon the house.
So, let’s say you can feel your walls “moving” (theoretically speaking). Can you depend on yourself and your repellents.
The answer is now, unless you are a specialist and/or you know how to thermally get rid of the insects, flood the nests, destroying all wooden mulch or something even more effective. In that case, you are doing everything like a professional.
They almost never depend only on insecticides, as there are cases when they don’t work. Because the most efficient methods are, as stated above, subjecting nests to large temperatures for more than half an hour, suffocating them in water, removing any attractive materials from the house, digging the nests up.Those solutions cut everything down at the same time, and are harmless to people. Though they better need to be executed when nobody is home. And that is why they are used by professionals.
Here you can learn more information about effective treatment method called tenting (fumigation): dangers for termites, preparing for fumigation and cleaning after, how long does this procedure last?
Are repellents toxic?
Simply put, yes, they are toxic and need to be used seriously, as they are essentially poisoning substances made for insects. Though any poison when in The only thing that fluctuates is the amount of harm they give. For serious methods (thermal processing, flooding etc.) it is equal to zero.
For natural repellents it is close to none. It depends for natural repellents – some are more effective and, as a trade off, more toxic, some are less. Some insecticides may even be too toxic for creatures to live close to them.
And even if some repellents are not as toxic, pets can be poisoned from them due to being closer to the ground, and sometimes having a tendency to sniff/eat anything they see.
Hence, you shall keep your pets on a safe distance from the anti-pesticide substances.
The best way of doing this is by moving your pet to another house, e.g. giving it to your friends, family, or by keeping it in your yard for a period of time, until you finally get rid of those annoying termites.
Small kid also can get poisoned, thus you need to patiently control all their movement and don’t let them close to repellents currently in use, especially if they are easily accessible.Useful articles
If you interested in more information of termites we recommend you to read the following articles:
- All types of termites. Are they harmful to humans? Can they bite you? And what is the difference between drywood and subterranean ones?
- What does swarmers of different species look like: drywood, subterranean, formosan?
- Signs of infestation outside and in the house: in walls or furniture.
- How to treat them at home and in the yard: in wood or in fence. How long this process lasts and what is pre-construction and soil treatment?
- What does termite holes look like? What is droppings and is it toxic to humans? Do termites make noises?
- Posible termite damage, how does it look like? Examples of damage in walls and wood floors.
- All about flying termites: how do they look like, swarming season and what to do if there are swarmers in your house?
- How do they do nests and mounds? How to find it in your garden or inside the house?
- Termite life cycle – from egg to larvae. And social hierarchy: workers, soldiers, queen.
- Did you know that termites can infest living trees, for example a palm or a pine tree. They also like to live in stumps.
- You can prevent the infestation by using barriers, such as: HomeGuard, Physical systems, Safeguard, Stainless steel mesh, Kordon.
- If you want to get rid of termites naturally, learn more about such methods as: heat or cold treatment, orange oil, using nematodes.
Conclusion
This is the most important stuff you need to know about repellents, and with this knowledge you should certainly be much more prepared for any infestations to come. And thank You for reading!
