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Termites?
updated: Jul 20, 2012, 9:01 AM

By Edhat Subscriber

Tonight we had scores of these in our dining room on the floor and climbing halfway up the walls. There are hundreds on the exterior stucco wall. Was there a termite swarm on the Mesa? Are these termites? Thank you!

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UPDATE: Another subscriber provided additional information about Termites. "This is a pile of termite dust. It came from our cedar lattice above it. Having had termites before in the NW, this mound is totally familiar as termite residue. Could someone recommend a company they were pleased with who do termite tenting? Thanks."

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Comments in order of when they were received | (reverse order)

COMMENT 299684	2012-07-20 09:09 AM
CLARK! where are you....? You've got serious termites if they made it to the interior...
COMMENT 299690P	2012-07-20 09:17 AM
Hard to tell from the photo. We had a lot of bugs in the house last night from the heat. We've had subterranean termites in the past -- you can identify subterraneans because they drop their wings and then look for mates.
COMMENT 299693	2012-07-20 09:30 AM
they seem too small. The ones I'm familiar with are the ones that come out after the first rain to swarm and they are much bigger. The bugs were very active last night during the sundowner.
COMMENT 299695	2012-07-20 09:38 AM
They appear small to be termites but they could be another type of ant that's doing the swarm dance. Best to check with the experts. Catch a few and take them to the local exterminator.... save yourself the house call fee.
MTNDRIVER	2012-07-20 09:43 AM
We often get swarms of flying subterranean termites outside when the weather suddenly gets hot--like yesterday. As 690P said, they then drop their wings and go crawling around, and usually most of them die very quickly. Hard to tell if that's what is in your photos--the wings of these termites are very fragile and longer than the body. Body looks much like a very large black ant when the wings come off.
COMMENT 299720	2012-07-20 10:35 AM
OP here. Husband thought they could be ants too. This morning they're all dead and the swarm is gone, thank heavens!!! I remember the day we moved into our house 12 years ago, there was a termite swarm on the Mesa and my husband freaked out, convinced we had just purchased an infested house (even though the bug inspector had said we were clear). He had me emptying every dresser and wiping down all furniture with spray before it could come in house. He's still living that one down!!!
COMMENT 299725	2012-07-20 10:40 AM
call Gabe at Lenz pest, he know everything.
COMMENT 299728P	2012-07-20 10:48 AM
I looked up termites on wiki to see if they have a photo of the termite droppings that are so indicative of termites but didn't see one. So I took a photo of my own, since we now have a pile on our porch, which I'll send to Ed.
D8VANILLA	2012-07-20 10:55 AM
Start spraying.... Look for the "droppings", which look like light-colored speckled dust .... , then find the pin-hole, and generously spray into that hole. Those definitly look like termites when they are looking for a new place to live.
COMMENT 299775	2012-07-20 12:00 PM
The only company I've used is Anacapa Termite, but I was totally satisfied. I accompanied the inspector under and around the house and he showed me what he was looking for as evidence of an active termite problem. The price for tenting seemed reasonable. And although I received quotes for fixing the termite damage to structural members, I felt no pressure to hire them to do that part of the work (a contractor once warned me to hire the pest control company to tent, but get someone with carpentry experience to make the repairs).
COMMENT 299847	2012-07-20 03:16 PM
Escalera Pest Control seems to do most of the tenting in SB. That pile of "termite dust" looks very familiar to me and is due to termites.
COMMENT 299906	2012-07-20 06:36 PM
That pile of droppings is called "frass", which comes from drywood termites.
GREG	2012-07-20 09:46 PM
Lenz Pest Control - have been dependable to our family for decades.
COMMENT 299963	2012-07-21 07:29 AM
You have a serious termite problem!!! Photo of the pile of sand is actually pellets of termite feses on the floor. Photos of wings still attached indicate they may be ready to move (swarm), since you already have piles of pellets; I think they have been there for some time. You rarely see them and you have photos, means your building is loaded with termites. My brother experienced this in an apartment one year; he removed a board attached to the wall and they swarmed out of the wall. They had to evacuate the entire apt complex and tent the building.
MTNDRIVER	2012-07-21 08:44 AM
The termites that swarm and fly are subterranean termites, different ones from the dry wood termites that leave the fecal pellets. They are treated differently. Dry wood termites live in the wood, the others live underground, as you'd imagine from their name. Lenz has been good in my (limited) experience, but they are likely to advise tenting the whole house. Chemicals that they use in tenting for termites now do not last as long as in the past (toxicity to humans, etc), but it doesn't cost any less as a result of that.... Tenting is usually what is advised, rather than spot treating (injecting poisons into wood or other areas). Tenting is quite expensive and quite a hassle for the homeowner as well, and sometimes I think the exterminators advise it when spot treating would be fine. I know that some exterminators have begun using heat, but I don't know if those in our area have done so. The concept is interesting, heating the whole place so that inside wall spaces, etc are hot enough to kill anything living there. (Also expensive, I hear.) That was developed for bedbugs, notoriously hard to get rid of, but it works for termites....
8111989	2012-07-21 08:58 AM
Looks like everyone has this covered. A tenant of mine was bombarded by the flying (subterranian) variety and I was out of town so I let Lenz take care of it for $485. (They drilled holes in the tile floor and shot fumes down there.) Then I found out that these guys swarm for one day, drop wings, find mates, and move on. Wasted money. A night in a motel for the tenant would have been cheaper. The other kind, the little pellets of feces can be dealt with by spot-treating. You don't have to tent the whole house. They've found a comfortable home in your rafters, so you need to treat the wood. Good luck.
COMMENT 300000	2012-07-21 09:23 AM
@989 - That is absolutely not true. If they are seeing termites that easily it most likely means they have a heavy enough infestation that spot treating would not be effective. Also, I'm surprised to be hearing so many good things about Lenz. Usually I only hear negative reviews. Most of their technicians were fired from other local pest control companies.
COMMENT 300035	2012-07-21 11:23 AM
@OP Ants don't have wings. The swarm is harmless so it doesn't matter that it's gone ... what's not gone are the termites busy eating your home. @8111989 So what if the winged adults move on? The problem isn't with them. Not is the problem with termite feces. The problem is with the termites that are busy throughout the structure with consuming it.
COMMENT 300055P	2012-07-21 12:42 PM
You need a close-up to see the difference between a flying ant and termite. Google the differences; thorax and antennae. If you get a contractor, they can poke around under the house and floorboads, for example, spot-check and exterminate in specific places, instead of poisoning everywhere or tenting, unless you really have termites everywhere.
COMMENT 300077	2012-07-21 02:54 PM
Another vote for Escalera Pest Control. I had to tent my home a few months ago and contacted a couple places for bids. Escalera was the fastest to respond (sent an estimator out the same day) and had a very competitive bid.
COMMENT 300139P	2012-07-21 07:51 PM
Escalera tented my house, then one of their installers walked on the aluminum porch roof while it was covered by the tent and fell through it. They CLAIMED the hole in the panels (CLEARLY showing a print of a tennis sneaker) was "water damage" because it rained while the tent was on the house, and they went round and round with my insurance company for months. My photos of the damage and foot print eventually settled it. It was an unpleasant experience.
COMMENT 300229	2012-07-22 10:10 AM
@035 Actually, some ants do have wings. You can google "ants with wings", as I did, and there are even images that differentiate termites from winged ants. More commonly, queen ants bear wings, but they are quite big. Also there are carpenter ants and moisture ants that also have wings. Anyhow, google or wiki ants. :)

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