Friday, April 13, 2012

Carpenter Bees

Great God's Trousers! The Wood Bees Are Back! That's right, wooden fences, fascia boards and any unpainted outside wood structures beware. The large bees that seem to make a perfect round hole in your fence post,  leaving a pile of saw dust behind,  are back to make your life a living hell. I hate these bees, better known as carpenter bees or more properly, Xylocopa virginica.

These carpenter bees can cause a substantial amount of damage for their size, unlike the other wood destroying pest, termites, these bees do not eat the wood. They burrow or drill into the wood and make a right turn. Now multiply this tunnel by many years and many offspring later, and you can see that the damage can be big.

So the next questions would be just how do you get rid of these rotten stinkin flying wood wreckers, and are they in the carpenter union? Well, you can exclude them or try to mechanically keep them out via painting wood surfaces outside with a heavy latex type paint. Even then sometimes they drill. You can use pesticides, this can be dangerous if you don't know what you are doing, so maybe call a professional, lastly...buy plastic!

No doubt carpenter bees are a pain...and if you catch them during their season you may have some success at getting rid of them over time, but this all depends on the seasons. This year in Pennsylvania they emerged early...in March...due to a very warm winter and an unusually warm month of March. Their 2 seasons are spring and late summer, around August.

So, if you are unlucky enough to have these bees using your home for a breeding ground, you can do what I do, grab a tennis racket and swat the living bageesus out of them, call a pro, or try to do it yourself. Either way, be very careful.

4 comments:

Runescape Pest Control said...

Carpenter bees are really becoming a nuissance all around my house! They have really been messing up our siding and i've already spent hundreds of dollars on repairs.

Broken Arrow Pest Control said...

Carpenter Bees are a real problem here in Oklahoma. I was doing a carpenter ant repair and treatment on a home and while taking apart the trim on the window was lucky enough to find a living Carpenter Bee in a late metamorphic stage. The Bee itself was almost complete other than the wings. These pests can cause severe damage to a homes fascia and soffit amongst other things. Great blog and keep up the good work.

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Unknown said...

I'm really hoping that I won't have to deal with any carpenter bees this year. I'd hate to end up having to replace or repair anything on my property because of them! If I do find some, I think I'm just going to stick with hiring a professional to take care of it. Going at them with a tennis racket like you just isn't my style.
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