Box elder bug removal may require pest professional

Q. I have swarms of elder bugs on a sunny side of my house every summer and fall. An exterminator said he could spray the side of my house and attic to get rid of them, but that the bugs would come back anyway. What are elder bugs? Should I hire an exterminator, or isn't he worth it? Is there anything that I can do to prevent the bugs from returning?

A. Box elder bugs come from Box elder trees, so there must be one or more of these around your house or the neighborhood. These bugs cause no damage to homes. They seek winter shelter in cracks in siding, etc., and winter in the walls from where they emerge in the spring.

A pest-management professional can spray the south and west walls of the house at the appropriate time in your region in the fall, which will need to be repeated every year. A permanent cure is to cut down all Box elder trees in the vicinity - a drastic cure involving the loss of beautiful trees.

Q. I enjoy your excellent articles. We live in a termite area and I have been told that a combination of one gallon Clorox and one quart of vinegar mix around the foundation can prevent termites. Any information would be greatly appreciated. Keep up the good work. We enjoy all the information.

A. There are many interesting suggestions flying around. This sounds like one of them. I certainly have never heard of it before.

Your best bet, considering how much damage termites can cause to a building, is to have a pest-management professional treat your house against them. I prefer to call a local independent, family-owned pest management professional. They are less likely to pressure you into expensive long-term maintenance contracts that may not be needed. However, follow-up visits following the initial treatment are wise for the first year.

Q. We have an oil-fired boiler that was installed in 1978 when our two-and-a-half story house was built. The boiler provides year-round domestic hot water, plus baseboard heat (and one room of radiant floor heat) as needed. We have three wood stoves fed with wood that we cut from our property. One of the stoves is used most of the winter season. The second stove is used frequently, but not every day. The third stove is rarely used. The area of the house is about 3,200 square feet, divided into six zones. The boiler averages about 1,000 gallons of oil per year. The boiler is serviced every fall, and the most recent efficiency rating was 72.5 percent. The technician has been advising us the last few years that it is time to consider a new boiler. The unit is also very noisy.

We would like to replace the boiler this spring. Our oil dealer recommends the System 2000. Is that a good choice? We welcome your guidance on a choice of improvements to our heating system. Also, we are wondering if we would benefit from an energy check on the whole house. One of our zones seems to be hard to heat in very cold weather, although there are no obvious drafts.

A. It is time to replace your 1978 boiler with a new energy-efficient one. Energy Kinetics System 2000 is a good choice, as it is very efficient and claims to be very quiet. Earlier models I'm familiar with were not so quiet, according to some clients. Perhaps they have improved them.

Your heating contractor should be able to check why one zone does not seem to be providing you with satisfactory heat. The new boiler may be eligible for tax credit as an energy improvement. Check with your accountant if the heating contractor is not sure. Considering the age of your house, an energy audit may be advisable.

Q. In my "infinite wisdom" I decided one morning to turn my 12-year-old laminate matte kitchen countertop into high gloss using some very old Johnson Wax "Future" acrylic floor finish for no-wax floors.

It looked beautiful until I put wet/warm dishes on it, which left unsightly rings that I could not remove. I then tried to strip the entire acrylic finish with a mix of ammonia, floor cleaner and water - it worked in some areas but not on others. The result is so bad the only solution may be to replace the whole countertop, which of course I cannot afford. I religiously read your column, am very impressed with your helpful suggestions and am hoping you'll have some remedies for me.

A. First, a word to the wise: Never mix ammonia with any product containing bleach. It's a deadly combination. Since you are still around, the floor cleaner must not have contained bleach.

Have you tried repeating the first stripping you did? If that does not work, try gently rubbing the remaining areas with a nonabrasive powdered cleanser and a damp cloth. You may also want to try mixing white vinegar and cream of tartar. The proportions are 1 cup cream of tartar to 1 gallon vinegar - adjust it accordingly. If any reader has had a similar experience and successfully removed the floor wax, please let me know and I'll pass it along.

Q. I have a full bath on my second floor and a powder room in my laundry room/basement. All of my drains seem to work fine, except for the commode in the second floor bathroom. I have spoken to a few plumbers and they say that the problem has them baffled. The problem appeared out of nowhere.

I have plunged and augured it numerous times and it will flush "normally" (to a point) with liquids or solids for one to three flushes and then becomes clogged again. There is no consistency between episodes and sometimes it clears after moderate plunging and the next time it might take two to three times as long to clear. It makes absolutely no sense to me. Any suggestions?

A. I understand your frustration, having dealt with a similar problem with a wall-hung toilet. I got so tired of it I replaced the toilet with a new 1.6-gallon American Standard. It works like a charm. I am saving a lot of water and my disposition has improved greatly. I use the toilet with a smile instead of an angry growl.

Considering that you have plunged it and augured it a number of times yourself, perhaps it's time to consider having a plumber do a more thorough job with an electric auger. If that does not change things drastically, it may be time for a replacement.

Q. I have a problem with gnats or no-see-ums. They are very tiny like fruit flies and are abundant in my laundry room, which includes a washer, a dryer vented to the outside, a freezer, hot water heater, water softener and a sink that drains into a pump. The pump pushes the water to my septic. I have had this problem since last spring. They multiply and multiply. They are hard to see. I see them hanging on the glue flytraps and sticky window patches I have purchased. I cannot find out where they come from or how to get rid of them. Could you please help me?

A. Although it is unlikely that you have plants in the laundry room, it sounds as if these bugs are fungus gnats that grow in the soil of over-watered soil. They may come from an adjacent room with plants and move into the laundry room if it is very bright, as they are attracted to light. Take samples caught on the flypaper or window patches to the entomology department of the extension service of your local university for proper identification and suggestions for control.

Q. My wife and I bought a log home 5 1/2 years ago. The logs are cedar and the soffit/fascia is pine. The carpenter bees were having a great time drilling into the soffit. A couple of months later, woodpeckers would displace the bee's burrows. I have the wood sprayed every spring by an exterminator and I am sure it helps but doesn't completely correct the problem.

I have since built a large detached garage and used pine log siding on it because the price of cedar has gone up. I have treated this siding twice with weather-resistant stain. The first summer the garage was complete, the carpenter bees began enjoying my nice new pine siding. I want to get a handle on this as soon as possible and was hoping you had some new technology or some old wisdom that could help me preserve my property.

A. Carpenter bees drill round holes about an inch deep into the edge of unpainted boards, boards with very old paint and boards with clear or semitransparent stain. Then they turn 90 degrees and drill "galleries" that are 4 to 6 inches long and lay their eggs, one at a time, in cells that they close as they progress.

Insecticide dust, wettable powders and aerosol residual formulations work best, but aerosol injection systems are the most efficient way to treat galleries, according to the National Pest Management Association (NPMA). The NPMA recommends not sealing the galleries for 24 to 48 hours so that the queen bee has time to be exposed to the lethal application. Carpenter bees rarely attack painted wood, so you may want to apply a fresh coat of paint to any vulnerable areas if the coating you have been applying is a semitransparent stain. The vulnerable areas can be protected by spraying them with an appropriately labeled repellent for flying insects. Although a licensed pest-management professional can perform the treatment in the spring, you may be able to follow up by spraying the holes with such a repellent.

Q. Several years ago, stink bugs first appeared in my New Jersey neighborhood. When it was warm, they would cling to my window screens. Then they began to move inside my home (an attached townhouse/condominium).

Some seemed to take up residence at the base of the skylight in my master bathroom (a nice, warm, sunny spot). Needless to say, I am not happy having these bugs fly into my bedroom, resting on my bathroom towels, etc. I have had the exterminator in numerous times, spraying the interior of the skylight, the roof, my attic, the front and rear of my unit, etc. I have had the skylight resealed and branches of nearby trees have been cut back. Not only do some stink bugs survive these precautions, but they now appear year round, regardless of the temperature. Do you have any suggestions for getting rid of the stink bugs on a permanent basis?

A. The stink bugs affecting you are likely to be conifer seed bugs. They are called stink bugs because of the unpleasant odor emitted when they are crushed. They are looking for winter cover and can get in the house.

Has your pest-management professional performed a perimeter treatment with a microencapsulated product? That is what is recommended to reduce or prevent their lodging in the cracks they find on your siding and trim. But once they have entered the house, they are hard to get rid of, so it is likely that you will need several more interior treatments. It is best to try to prevent them from moving in by caulking every crack between dissimilar materials from foundation to roof, checking for tightness of all window screens, etc.

• Henri de Marne's column appears Sundays. He was a remodeling contractor in Washington, D.C., for many years, and is now a consultant. Write to him in care of the Daily Herald, P.O. Box 280, Arlington Heights, IL 60006, or via e-mail at henridemarne@gmavt.net.

© 2009, United Feature Syndicate Inc.