Types Of Termite Protection
What types of termite protection are available when building your home?
The three main ways are:
- Use a physical termite barrier built into your home
- Use a chemical termite barrier
- Use termite resistant roof or wall frames
Physical Termite Barriers are either:
- Stainless steel mesh
- Granulated rock
Chemical Termite Barriers are:
- Spraying liquid termiticides under the concrete slab and in trenches around external perimeter of your home
- Reticulation of liquid termiticides through a piped system under and around your home
- Stainless steel mesh is used to block off hidden entry by using the mesh as a flange around the pipes coming through the concrete slab and fitting mesh into the wall cavity of the perimeter of the home.
- Granulated stone is based on the principle that the granules are too heavy for the termites to move and thus to get through..
Chemical Termite Barriers
These chemical barriers have varied degrees of toxicity that claim to either repel or kill termites and are applied in different ways:
- hand sprays
- reticulation systems, and
Chemical termite barriers begin to lose their effectiveness the moment they are installed due to climatic, environmental conditions and disturbance
You must re-treat your home from time to time. This means respraying, or filling up the reticulation system
The blankets or plastic sheeting are impregnated with chemicals and are reliant on the chemical to repel termites.
Termite Resistant Roof or Wall Frames
You can build with steel or treated timber frames which are termite resistant however this does not mean your home is fully protected against termites.
There many items termites can still attack such as cupboards, carpets, timber door frames even electrical cable.
For whole of home termite protection it is critical that an approved form of termite barrier is also installed at the time of construction.