How Do Termites Behave in Winter? Part-I

Feb 21

When snow covers your head, you may think you are safe from termites or other bugs. There is no fly buzz around the trash cans or no hornet to your exterior. You would not see any swarmer crawling on the windowsills. You think termites go away in winter and your home is safe. Hold on, in winter termites never go away and possess threats. If you find termite signs at your home, you must call an exterminator. See here to learn more about termites.

Termite and Cold

Termites are cold-blooded. Unlike the warm-blooded animals and other creatures, termites share the same temperature as wind, soil or air around them. The only way cold-blooded creatures find to escape the cold is to hide in someplace where it cold is not that biting. Termites and similar subterranean insects travel in a deeper level of soil and wait until the weather passes.

Do Termites Go in Hibernation?

If the weather is bitterly cold, termites may go into hibernation. Termites slow down when the temperature starts dropping. When the winter starts running below the scale, the live-in their colony only and wait for the ground to get warm. When the temperature is freezing or snow has covered the ground for a longer time, termites’ colony does not survive.

Termite in Your Home During Winter

If there are termites in your home during winter, they could be subterranean termites. They come from drying woods or grounds or live in the walls. They build mud tubes on the wall. The tubes are moist. Termites build the moisture in basements, crawl space, storage space, closets, bathrooms, and attics. Dry wood termites make exit places and push their feces out of the tunnel. The faces look like pepper grain on the windowsills.

Termite Signs

Look at the attic and the crawl spaces. These are good places to start looking for termites.
Check if there are grooves or channels on the exposed woods.
If you find in direct contact with soil, start digging. When you found grooves at the outside of woods.
See if there are frass around wooden structures at your home. Frass is a component that looks like dust and it is the excrement of termites. They keep their tunnels clean and tidy and push frass out of the tunnels.
Search for mud tubes on the foundation walls. As the name suggests, mud tubes are made of mud and have width like a pencil. Termites use mud tubes to move from one place to another, but they cannot move without coming out. In that case, mud tubes protect them from the sun. Knock the wooden structures at home, if there are hollow sound, termites could be there.
Swarm is another sign of termite presence. In the reproductive time, termites come out with a large swarm as they are ready to mate. They reproduce in spring and often are confused with flying ants. If you see a large group but do not understand what it is, have a close look. Termites have features like straight antennae, wide waists and two pair of identical wings.
You may not find the swarm, then look for the wings. Termites leave the wings once they find their mates. If you find a pack of wings on the ground, this is a sign of termites.