No Termites Here

I took action after our last post and called a few pest control companies. Some wanted to charge a lot of money just to come out and take a look (which could be credited to any service we purchased based on their recommendations) and one was free. Free is an easy commitment to make, so I went with that one, at least as a starting point.

The guy took a thorough look around the exterior of our home as well as our basement, garage and doorways. He pointed out a few spots that had signs of previous termite activity, confirming what we knew from our original inspection 2.5 years ago. Here was one spot on our basement wall with previous damage.

(Here's the zoomed out view for context--it's above the left side of the water boiler.)

We also have some sealed up tubes in the garage wall that I didn't get a picture of.

Happily, he saw no signs of an active population now, but couldn't date the last infestation and therefore the last date of treatment. He asked me questions about the paperwork generated from our home inspection. And to my surprise, I was actually able to find what he asked for--a document called a "Wood Destroying Insect Report." Unfortunately, it didn't shine any light on the last time our house was fully treated for termites (with a product called Termidor), which lasts about 7 years. So the verdict, at least with this company, seems to be that we just have to wait until we see signs of termites, and then take action, or at least check again in a few years. We can't get under a warranty until we treat for termites but he didn't advise doing it yet, since we could still be protected now if the house was treated recently. And of course it doesn't come cheap. It was nice not being pushed into expensive products we don't actually need.

I also described our other insect problems like spider crickets and centipedes and he recommended basic services that includes a one-time major interior and exterior application of insecticides followed by quarterly exterior services and any additional mitigation. It would cost about $350/year, so now I just have to decide how much I value not finding those little legs on our carpet during spider cricket season.