Termites: The Silent Enemy

Do you worry about your house damage caused by termite infestation? If so, you are not alone. Every year termites cause billions of dollars in structural damage, and property owners spend over two billion US dollars to treat them. In fact, the termite cause more damage to structures than all natural disaster like tornadoes, hurricanes, hail, flooding and windstorms. This fact sheet focuses on how you, as a property’s owner, can protect your property from termite through effective prevention measure and appropriate for termite treatments in Malaysia.

How do I Know if I Have Termites?

The first step in prevention is to be recognized them where a signal of the termite infestation. Termites are normally hiding their activities through which they are tunneling (mud tubes), such as food delivery, exploring of newer food source or preventing of their natural predators.

Most Frequent Termite Infestation Spots

Most people are not aware of termite infestation until they see damages from their wooden furniture. Above are the areas that need to pay attention to Inspect by probing, exposed wood for hollow spots (using a screwdriver or similar tool). Conducting a termite inspection is a difficult and time consuming task, the key to a success inspection is to found and trace their mud tubes back to their entry point in the building or to their nest, as in some cases, termites from more than one colony can be infesting in a structure.

How Can I Prevent Termite Infestation?

There are varieties of methods to prevent / minimize termite damage to buildings:

• Pre-Construction
  • Using concrete foundation and make sure ventilation space between the soil and wood.
  • Reducing the amount of the timber in building
  • Termiticides applied as a spray to the soil under building slab as well as around the footing, ground beam and apron before lean-concrete. 
  • Installing of reticulated piping system during the pre-construction period for long-term retreatment at any time in the future
• Post-Construction
  • Drilling and inject termiticides through the concrete into the soil as the chemical barrier to lessen the risk for termite access through underneath
  • Installing of In-Ground Bait station surround the building to create a defence line for lessen the risk of the infestation and it have been introduced to help reduce the overall use of insecticides and their impact on human health and the environment. These systems rely on cellulose baits that contain a slow-acting insecticide.

Maintain the Termite Prevention Features

• After construction, keep the soil around the foundation dry through proper grading and drainage (including maintenance of gutters and downspouts).
• Reduce openings that offer termites access to the structure (filling cracks in cement foundations as well as around where utilities pass through the wall with cement, grout, or caulk).
• Fix leaks immediately.
• Keep vents free from blockage, including plants.
• Ensure that trees and shrubs are not planted too close to the structure and do not allow them to grow against exposed wood surfaces.
• Inspect periodically to help ensure that termite colonies do not become established.