Home Improvement Advice for Mold & Mildew

What About The Inside Do it Yourself Tips for Mold & Mildew

Internally if you see small holes 1-2 mm in diameter appearing in your floorboards or other timbers, perhaps even in your furniture you may have woodworm! Under stair cupboards, underfloor voids and roof voids are the favourite haunts of these little beasts. The damp area around the base of the toilet is often a favourite spot in older houses.

Surveyors at Work

Storing old wooden boxes or old wicker baskets in the loft may be easy, but you run the risk of transferring woodborers from such items to the precious timbers of your roof. Have a clear out now and dispose of unwanted items.

There are numerous woodboring insects, which can infest the timbers of buildings in the US, some only occurring in certain areas of the country and some only affecting certain types of wood. All may cause defacement of the wood they are feeding upon and in a very serious case may cause the timber to break or fail. This failure will often occur to sapwood floorboard edges.

Woodboring insects have long life cycles and are often causing the damage whilst remaining unseen. When the holes appear, it indicates that adult beetles have emerged and are seeking to mate and lay eggs.

The adult emergence occurs generally in the spring and summer, but varies with insect species; it is simply called the 'flight season'. During this time the adult males only interest is in mating, in spring a woodworms thoughts certainly turn to love.

Adult beetle emerging

Adult beetle about to fly

It's worth remembering that the most commonly occurring woodborer in the US is the Common Furniture Beetle and that this insect also lives outside in the dead parts of living trees. This being the case it can be carried into the house in firewood logs or other timber as well as simply flying in under its own power. It is often mistaken for a small fly when inside the house.

If you see serious cracks or fissures suddenly developing in wooden floors, or skirting boards, or see mushrooms starting to grow or even smell strong musroomy smells you may have a serious problem of fungal decay. Brick red dust billowing from below a skirting board or appearing over floor or carpet surfaces may be the spore dust of the True Dry Rot fungus, this is a really serious woodrotting fungi.

The most common area for visible fungal decay is in the external faces of painted windows and sills where the paint film has failed and is allowing water to get into the timber. Air borne fungal spores can settle and germinate in such conditions. The fungi most commonly causing these problems are wet rots. Wet rots really do need excessive water in the timber to allow their development; so keeping on top of your painting is vital!

Dry rot sporophore

Dry rot in a floor

Typical decay in a joist

Sometimes decay develops as a result of a serious water spillage or flood so diligence after a burst pipe, overflowing roof tank, or a real flood is very important.

Decay caused by the True Dry Rot fungus can be frightening and expensive to deal with and does need specialist advice.

Crucially, a part of that advice must relate to drying the area and reducing the timber moisture content to below 20% w/w as an urgent action. This is more important than specifying treatment in the first instance. It is important to establish thorough drying conditions throughout the whole affected area as soon as possible. Taking this action will reduce air humidity and allow the wetted timbers to dry. If there is a risk of storm water entering, say through missing slates or tiles, temporary weather sealing is essential until a proper repair can be effected.