Wood beetle identification

[James White]

Does anyone know what kind of beetle this is? There has been a few that hatched out of my lumber and I would like to know what I am up against. It is less than 3/8" in length and the body is very cylindrical or barrel shaped.

[Mel Fulks]

Don’t know what the thing is , but it sounds like your lumber was not kiln dried .

[Ronald Blue]

Certainly looks like a powder post beetle.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powderpost_beetle

https://extension.umd.edu/resource/powderpost-beetles

[James White]

I wish I had gotten a better picture as there seems to be many that look alike. This is air dried lumber that is going to have to get taken out of the shop anyway. But I would like to look up some more info regarding life cycle and whether it is one of the beetles that can live in low moisture content wood.

[Maurice Mcmurry]

I know what powder post beetle larva look like and recognize their work. I have them working away in some Red Oak 6 X 6's :mad:. 4 coats of copper green wood preservative does not slow them down a bit. I may try boiling the posts inside a steel culvert and / or a borax treatment.

[Tom M King]

Do a Google reverse image search.

Looks like the PPB in Ronald's link to me.

[roger wiegand]

PPB. Heat is the accepted means of sterilizing the wood, there's a USDA table of time and temperatures, but it's something like 140 degrees in the center of the wood for something like three hours. There are higher and shorter alternatives and lower and slower choices, nothing below something like 135 deg if I recall. Fumigation with methyl bromide also works, but unless you have a facility that does it it's impractical. It's very toxic, but also very volatile so it doesn't remain in the product. I've been told but haven't confirmed that there is a facility somewhere near here (related to the port) that will fumigate and entire semi-truck trailer or shipping container at a time; apparently it's used routinely on pasta and other grain products. I doubt they will mess with anything smaller than a shipping container, but if you have that much wood it might be worth exploring.

Heat is much easier and more accessible.

In my experience borate is effective on finished pieces (I treated my whole barn with bora-care, no evidence of activity since. It's only a surface treatment, so not effective if you're going to further process the wood.

[Richard Coers]

I know what powder post beetle larva look like and recognize their work. I have them working away in some Red Oak 6 X 6's :mad:. 4 coats of copper green wood preservative does not slow them down a bit. I may try boiling the posts inside a steel culvert and / or a borax treatment.
Boiling red oak in steel will likely turn the wood black.

[Richard Coers]

To sterilize my bowl blanks, I have an old upright freezer and a single burner hot plate with a huge aluminum heat sink on top of the burner. I have yet to make an electronic controller, but I just move the knob on the hot plate and watch the temp with a remote meat thermometer. For the bowl blanks I go 2 days at 90 degrees just to get started. I move up the temp every two days until I get to 150. Then hold there for 3 days. All of this is after I've cut every hole and tunnel I have found. I've been sterilizing wood I harvested 10 years ago and I saw some live larvae still deep in the wood while trimming on the bandsaw. I've read that the eggs can remain viable for 12 years or more.