[Note: this is another blog based on my weekly emails to my family on the mainland.]
3/7/21
Aloha Everybody –
On Thursday morning about 11:30 the tenting crew showed up and immediately began preliminary work. We had finally bagged all the food in the refrigerator and chest freezer just before they arrived, opened all the windows, cabinet doors and drawers, hidden our valuables, turned off the propane tank, and packed a few things for our two-nights away from home. During the week we prepared the outdoors by moving a LOT of potted plants to a gas-free location, making sure bushes were trimmed back, and moving anything else that might be in the way of the tent. After consulting with the foreman and giving him our keys, we left and went for a workout at Planet Fitness, then had lunch of fried chicken at our local Willies.
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| The Termite Tent of Doom |
The Sheraton was very nice. It’s just four miles from our house, close to where we go to Farmers Market each Saturday. They gave us a room with a beautiful view of Keauhou Bay, with a large lanai where we had a sunset beer. They seem to be making the best of the pandemic situation by catering to locals like us who want a few days away from home, though there were also a fair number of tourists. We made a bee-line for the pool and hot tub, which is also where we spent the next morning and afternoon. Both nights I slept like a rock, plus took some long naps by the pool. It was very nice, and turned out to be a good preparation for the work of re-combobulation starting with a brief visit home Friday afternoon when the house was cleared to enter (the tent comes off after 12-16 hours, then the house is aired out for another 8 hours). We stopped by just to secure things again and to make sure all was ok.
Saturday we returned about 10:30 am and began the real work of reversing all the preparations we had taken, and this is continuing today as well. We figure by Wednesday we might be back to normal. I did find a few things that need to be fixed, understandable when you consider four guys were hefting big heavy tarps all around the house. No real complaints so far.
We’re certainly glad to have this behind us, and hope not to ever do it again. The treatment should be effective in stopping the termites, though it doesn’t prevent them from returning eventually. The proof will be in a few months, which is the time that the termite eggs hatch and emerge as flying insects. This was really bad last year, but there shouldn’t be any this time. We’ll see.
Stay warm and healthy. Remember "Spring?" It's just around the corner, I promise.
6 comments:
Perceived fatal for all insects, what was the affect on the 'house geckos'?
The lethality to "all" insects depends on the concentration and length of fumigation. As far as non-insects go, I read that it depends on metabolic rate, with mammals particularly susceptible. So far we've seen geckos that were in the house before tenting still there and alive, though they seem stunned and disoriented. We've found very few dead ones outside so far, so there may still be hope for our favored friends who come to breakfast by the pool.
Our last tenting netted a bat in the house! Didn't know there was one frequenting the premises. Otherwise it went as expected.
Now it’s time for all the ants to start consuming the corpses. I like the new word com ua Latino. Needs to go into Wikipedia.
Whoops, my computer certainly does not like the word combubalating :)
Now how did your completo come up with THAT? Mine has trouble, too, with re-combobulating and with combobulate though discombobulating is ok. Imagine trying to learn English as a non-native speaker!
So far our ants have made themselves scarce, but I'm sure they will be back. I've read that the little black ones that feed on wood like to nest in former termite complexes. I've learned to distinguish the droppings but the treatment is the same -- squirt some joy juice into the crack or hole they're coming and going from. I once followed a line of ants that stretched from one of our ceiling beams all the way down the outside of the house, across the driveway, and into a crack in the concrete.
RS
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