Post by Hamlet on Jul 8, 2019 7:32:45 GMT -8
Actually, it’s carpenter ants (we think) in the camper. 
Yesterday we we went to our property where Hamlet lives. We couldn’t stay the night, but wanted to check things out, have a hike and a meal before heading home. When I opened up the door and did a quick scan, I noticed a straight line of what looked like wood shavings across the table and benches in the back. There were a few scattered insect bodies and the line was a couple inches wide and about a quarter inch deep. I pulled the baskets out of the overheads and found what looked like a live carpenter ant. We caught it (crushing it, unfortunately) and scooped up some of the shavings.
The more I looked at the shavings, I realized they were more like grains, and not the color or texture of wood at all. My hubby concurred and I took a hot match to a bit of it. It melted away. Turns out, it’s the foam board insulation. We don’t see signs inside or outside of wood yet, thank heaven. We talked to a neighbor who said there are carpenter ants and gave us some spray that should kill them off for now, at least. We’ll head back in early August, pull the rear skins and get a good look.
So, two questions:
1) Has anyone dealt with anything like this?
2) Do we need to replace the butyl tape when we replace the skin?
Yesterday we we went to our property where Hamlet lives. We couldn’t stay the night, but wanted to check things out, have a hike and a meal before heading home. When I opened up the door and did a quick scan, I noticed a straight line of what looked like wood shavings across the table and benches in the back. There were a few scattered insect bodies and the line was a couple inches wide and about a quarter inch deep. I pulled the baskets out of the overheads and found what looked like a live carpenter ant. We caught it (crushing it, unfortunately) and scooped up some of the shavings.
The more I looked at the shavings, I realized they were more like grains, and not the color or texture of wood at all. My hubby concurred and I took a hot match to a bit of it. It melted away. Turns out, it’s the foam board insulation. We don’t see signs inside or outside of wood yet, thank heaven. We talked to a neighbor who said there are carpenter ants and gave us some spray that should kill them off for now, at least. We’ll head back in early August, pull the rear skins and get a good look.
So, two questions:
1) Has anyone dealt with anything like this?
2) Do we need to replace the butyl tape when we replace the skin?
