# What bug is this in my wood?



## Elizabeth (Oct 17, 2009)

I just got out to the shop for the first time in at least a month. I have some housekeeping projects to do, so one of the first things I did was pick up a dry chunk of log that has been sitting near the garage door for, oh, over a year, with the intent of moving it farther into the shop. It had been standing on its end.

I picked it up, and noticed a pile of sawdust around the edges of it. ...That can't be good.

I pulled it out into the driveway, and saw some of the bark was loosened. I chopped it away and found some little white grub-like things, at least four of them in the pieces I removed, eating holes along where the bark and wood meet. Here's my quick attempt at some pictures:

Live grub on left, squished one on right










Trail on the inside of a piece of bark:










Pulled up another piece of loose bark and found this guy at the top:










What are these?

There were other logs stored near this one, but not touching it. None of the nearby logs are showing sawdust signs, as far as I can tell. I don't remember how long ago I got this particular piece but I'd guess over two years and it has been air drying since. I probably got it with others. The others are in various spots around the shop. This piece wasn't always here. It used to be in the back for a while. In its current location, if a bug were to come through the edge of the garage door it would encounter this piece of wood first.

Most of my cut lumber is stored on wall racks. Only the logs are stored on the floor.

How screwed am I?

Secondary question, if I completely debark this piece and get rid of all the grubs, is it okay to keep, or should I just chuck it into the yard waste bin right now?


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## lew (Feb 13, 2008)

Not sure but might be a powder beetle grub
Check here- http://www.naturalhandyman.com/iip/infpests/infpowderpost.html


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## Elizabeth (Oct 17, 2009)

Hm. That piece is going in the waste bin now. It's nothing special and I don't want this to spread.


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## coachmancuso (Feb 10, 2013)

You can put it in a black bag tie it tight and leave it in the sun for a couple days


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## Elizabeth (Oct 17, 2009)

Will that work? I thought only kiln drying would kill them.

I checked some other pieces that looked the same (Apparently I didn't treat the ends of this batch) and found one more piece with bored exit holes and another piece with at least one grub. All next to each other.

Also checked a piece of Sweetgum lying nearby, with anchorseal on the ends. ...No, that one is just going moldy underneath the bark. FFS.


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## zwwizard (Mar 30, 2008)

Looks like you have a piece of walnut there. Strip the bark off and just scrap the log off, You should get all the grubs off that way, they just work under the bark. 
Power post beetles are tiny little things that like the sap wood mostly.


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## david_cii (Jan 13, 2011)

Yea, I agree.. I don't think that is a powder post beetle. The dust is like talc not at all what your pictures look like.. and like zwwizard said, they are tiny… that grub is way too big.
david


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## Blackie_ (Jul 10, 2011)

It is a beetle larvae, one of many species it looks real close to the longhorn beetle larvae and yes they tunnel through wood, Elizabeth if it can fit into a microwave that will also kill them anything with heat such as your oven for a short bit but not to long, the loose wood that the beetles cause can add character to the wood and you can harden it up by dripping super glue on it, the super glue finishes great it never leaves any sign.


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## bondogaposis (Dec 18, 2011)

They look like roundhead borers otherwise known as longhorn beetle. I'm pretty sure once you strip the bark they will be gone. Because it was standing on end it allowed the wood to wick moisture up into it. Those beetles work on the moist sapwood just under the bark. Once the bark is gone it will be too dry for them.


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## moonie (Jun 18, 2010)

hey guys down here in missouri we got like 6 countys that cant sale fire wood becouse of some Green bug that is eating ash and sawmills cant cut or sale any ash etherso you my what to look around its about a 1" long and green.


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## spunwood (Aug 20, 2010)

I don't know but I think I see one coming out of my nose!


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## crank49 (Apr 7, 2010)

I thing I read somewhere that 140 degrees F would kill bugs in lumber.
Due to the mass of those logs it might take a few days to soak the heat through from sitting in the sun, but I suspect it would work.


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## jumbojack (Mar 20, 2011)

The black plastic bag method, with bark stripping will do the trick. Im in California and I see this in wood piles all the time. Ive only seen them on wood with bark intact.


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## Blackie_ (Jul 10, 2011)

Nice to know Michael.


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## MT_Stringer (Jul 21, 2009)

You could put it on the dash of your car. 140 deg is easily obtainable when it is sitting out in the hot sun. I measured several places inside my truck once years ago when I was at work and had access to a high temp digital thermometer (used to measure tube temps in furnaces).

Actually, I am just kidding about putting it in your car but serious about the temps. The glass window adjacent to where my head normally would be when driving was 131 deg F. The console was about the same. The dash was 141. It was 98 outside.


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## Elizabeth (Oct 17, 2009)

Thanks guys. Feeling a bit better about all this now. I've pulled out the afflicted logs - since I hadn't sealed the ends they all cracked heavily anyway, so I decided to ditch them. Not seeing any loose bark on any pieces that had had sealed ends, but I'll keep an eye on them, and I have taken a bunch of air dried western red cedar boards (a couple of them showed similar trails) and black-bagged them in the driveway on Saturday. One of the bags appears to be melting so I guess they're getting pretty hot!

I also found this little guy in my shop, chilling out behind a piece of plywood that my bandsaw came in a few months back. He doesn't appear to be either a powder post or an asian longhorn beetle; not sure who he is. Forefinger for scale.










He was somewhere else in the shop entirely so I am hoping he's not a troublemaker.

I'm spending as much time as possible over the next few days cutting up the remaining sweetgum. I got through two pieces yesterday. Fun side note; yes they were starting to get a bit moldy, but some pieces have also got some interesting spalting from it. So I guess there's that. I haven't been running my dehumidifier because it appears to have broken. I guess that is why they started to mold.


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## coachmancuso (Feb 10, 2013)

The black bag will work I have done it before and it just takes a while not overnight. The black bag will attract the heat and with no oxygen they will die!


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## teejk (Jan 19, 2011)

David Dean…you are talking about the Emerald Ash Borer. Apparently came here with chinese pallets. It's spreading so the firewood thing is an attempt to slow it down. With a little more time baseball bats will have to come from maple because ash trees will have gone the way of elm and chestnut.


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## LakeLover (Feb 2, 2013)

Elizabeth.

Those grubs are some of the best bait for trout.

In case you need some relaxin time.


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## WDHLT15 (Aug 15, 2011)

Yes, longhorn beetle grubs. They do some damage to the wood, but are pretty much harmless otherwise, not like the dreaded powderpost beetle.


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## moonie (Jun 18, 2010)

Thanks teejk


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## matador8 (Jun 5, 2013)

Hi Elizabeth,

This might help you if you get enough black plastic to wrap your timber up with. Buy some borex or boron and mix
it up as a paste paint it all over your timbers,that has the bugs in. Then wrap it all up in the black plastic and leave it out in the hot sun for about a week or so that should kill them. A woodwork told me that years ago when I started in woodwork some years ago now. The borex you can buy that at the supermarkets and the boron in a produce places. Now the timber that has the channels or any other marks they left in the wood I saw a fella on another Forum that I'm on, what he did with those bugs was once they were dead and dried out he glued them back in the channels and holes than clear Estapol over them. It was a dinning room table and it looked great. I hope that works with your problem.

Cheers Graham.

.


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