Take a sample to the county agricultural agent.
"Tom" wrote in message
ups.com...
I work with a girl who has a screened-in deck. Her clapboard siding
where the deck meets the house is Cedar, and she has a dusty material
accumulating at the base of her siding on the floor of the screened-in
deck. She sweeps it away, and by the next day, it's back! She wasn't
sure of it's composition, so she brought a sample in to work for me to
examine. To the naked eye, it looks like dark brown sawdust, with
grains not much larger than ground black pepper. Under a 30x
microscope, I can see much of the material is insect parts... legs,
heads, and other ugly stuff. There were also some yellow translucent
balls of something that looks like Amber, some tiny seeds, and
something that might be insect droppings or 'frass'. I was leaning
towards it's origin being powder beetles, but I believe their mess
would not consist of so many insect parts. I am told there is no
evidence of other bugs, no spider webs or anything unusual.
Any thoughts as to what might be the source of this rapid accumulation
of insect carnage?