"Knotbob" wrote

In Jacksonville, Fl. where I live the pileated woodpeckers (think
large woody the woodpecker size) can break hunks of cedar fascia
(rough cut 2x4 and 2x6) and siding off looking for something to eat.

I remember the 1st time I came home and found pieces of wood 2' long
laying on the ground and thinking kids must of been playing with
(sharp pointed) make believe swords. When my neighbor told me what
really happened I couldn't believe it until I went home and looked up
overhead and saw the damage.

Now to the point, The woodpeckers are drilling for carpenter bees
(large black and yellow bumble bees). The carpenter bees burrow holes
up into the center of the wood about 1/4" round and then they turn and
drill 8-10" into the length of the cedar.
Every spring when the larvae hatches the woodpeckers can hear them
because they eat their way out of the tunnels filled with whatever mom
packed for them to eat.The woodpeckers just bust pieces of wood off
until they get to their meal.
Since the carpenter bees return to the scene of the crime year after
year it gets worse not better.
We tried all sorts of poisons and none of them worked. We tried some
stuff that was guaranteed to kill the hatchlings because you stick a
nozzle in each tunnel opening (100's of them and not easy to get to
either. Lots under gutters.) and spray this goop in there and when the
hatchlings eat their way through it they will die. WRONG! Didn't work.

The next to best thing we did was stationed bad mitton rackets at
every exterior door. When the moms come to lay eggs you kill as many
as you can for about a 2 week period. Then when the eggs hatch and the
bees come out you can kill some more with the rackets until they
disappear to wherever they go to plot their revenge for you next
spring.

The rackets really did cut down on the numbers of bees and it was good
therapy to smash 4 or 5 of them every time you went outside. I
especially liked it when pieces of the bees were stuck in the racket.
(Not PC but what else can I say but the truth.)

We finally replaced all of the fascia boards that were so riddled with
holes when we had our shingles replaced. We actually replaced the
shingles sooner than we needed to just to get rid of the bee problem.
We timed it to remove the boards after the larvae had been laid.
(Almost) All of the trim was replaced with treated lumber stained
reddish brown to match the cedar.
I say almost because in spring some bees returned. They were supposed
to be hauled off to the dump with the larvae still buried in the wood
but I found out the following spring that the roofing company didn't
replace two of the fascia boards. When I talked to the contractor he
remembered that out of all of the fascia boards they removed there
were 2 that weren't riddled with holes to bad so he flipped them over
and used them again.
I felt like supergluing a woodpecker to his head.
In the end he did r & r those fascia boards for me.
Damn what a story! I wish I didn't know this story.
Robb Smith
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Which explains the popularity of plastic and cement based fascia boards now.
Particularly in warm climates. Anything an insect can eat into is a
candidate for some kind of subsitute that the bugs don't like. These non
wood items don't rot either.