Termites swarming.

Leah Frances

Today at approximately 10:00 am every termite in my neighborhood hatched and swarmed. For about 1.5 hours about a million of these flying suckers were all over everything! I could see them up to a block away.

My dogs were licking them up off the front porch. My chickens were snatching them out of the air. I taped up my long sleeves and wrapped a bandana around my neck to keep them from crawling all over me.

Then, like that *poof* they were gone. The only signs left were the scads of wings all over everything.

Needless to say, my exterminator is coming to spray again.

__________________
If I could only remember to THINK about what I was doing before I did it.

chrisn

About 15 years ago this happened IN the house, needless to say terminex was also called.

biz123

Good to call an exterminator. However, a word of caution on them..

My grandma had a termite problem and called an exterminator. They charged her a monthly fee and never solved the problem. She just bought some sort of termite spray and they were gone. Needless to say, the extermination service was over with. Unless the problem is really big (like it seems to be in your case), you don't need an exterminator.

chrisn

Well you might be right but I will say that we already had an existing account with Terminex and when my wife was cleaning and discovered all the wings in the window sill one morning. I did some investigating and discovered a colony busy eating my living room oak flooring, under the rug.( If I had not looked under there at that time,who knows how long they would have kept eating until someone fell through thr floor!) Anyway, we called Terminex( on a Sunday morning) and they came out( that day) and sprayed. It was discovered that they had come up through the stone foundation, up the back wall into the living room floor, window sill and frame.All were replaced inside a week and the carpenter that did it was just incredible. I came home from work to inspect the floor ( 1 inch oak from 1924) and literally could not tell the new work from the old. Un believable! Needless to say, we still pay for Terminix yearly. It would have cost thousands to do the work that was done otherwise. Just one happy ending

oh'mike

Biz--I'm sorry you had a bad experience---There are incompetent people in the world.

Also some fine tradesmen who are a joy to work with. --Mike---

downunder

Leah,
They just now swarmed? I didn't realize "y'all" had termites that far north but in GA they swarm around April. Any chance they could have been ants?

__________________
If it's worth doing, it's worth doing right. If you wouldn't put your name on it, it ain't done right!

Leah Frances

Downunder - confirmed termites by the exterminator. I 'detained' a few (in a plastic bag) for inspection. We've been looking for them to swarm since April, but we had a long cool and wet spring - this swarm happened on the first HOT and SUNNY day of the year.

Believe it, or not, but our high today is 78. Atlanta's is quoted to be 89. Ya'll is WAY hotter than we are. Bet you're getting tomatoes already too.

__________________
If I could only remember to THINK about what I was doing before I did it.

Thurman

I'm with "downunder". Way down here in S. GA. we seem to have what looks like termites swarm during the spring each year. These are definitely ants though. Leah, I understand you had yours inspected and they were termites, yuk. These darn ants must breed these winged type, they just sit in a tunnel underground, all lined up, until the "King" ant shouts "Start your wings". Then the exit door is opened and ka-jillions of them just fly out all at once. Ka-jillions is going to be the new amount of National Debt one day--learn that numerical number. Where these ants go, we don't know, nor do we actually give-a-hoot. David