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 The Trouble with Termites
Before termites seriously damage your home, arm yourself with the facts. It's essential for homeowners to understand how termites function and the methods pest control operators use to best control them. Termites are organized, persistent, and most importantly, destructive creatures. Each year they cause over $1 billion in damage to homes in the United States alone. With a staggering figure like that, it's not surprising that pest control operators treat some 600,000 homes annually. That's because the best defense you have in stopping termites from destroying your home is an effective termiticide treatment applied by a trained professional.
A Revolutionary Solution
Introduce yourself to Premise' 75 Insecticide, the innovative termiticide that more and more pest control operators are recommending. Its unique chemistry makes it an effective, low-risk choice for termite control. By spreading throughout the soil, PREMISE provides a complete treated zone around your house against intruding termites-a feature we call Lateral Soil Movement'. And PREMISE has no odor. Its low-impact chemistry isn't volatile, meaning there are no airborne particles to create an unpleasant smell. What's more, PREMISE, when used at labeled rates, is not expected to have any effect on humans and other mammals. If you choose, you and your family can remain at home during the entire application procedure.
PREMISE SAFETY
Sweet Success Without the Smell
Of course, the biggest concern with the use of any chemical is its effect on you, your family and the environment. The goal of any pest control operator is to protect your home without interrupting your lives. With Premise' 75 Insecticide, you need not worry about unpleasant chemical smells after treatment. PREMISE is odorless. It has such low volatility that no airborne particles result. And because PREMISE is a dry powder formulation, it doesn't contain any strong solvents either. So unless you actually see the pest control operator apply PREMISE to your house, you probably won't even know it's there.
A Treatment that Everyone can Live With
Extensive research shows that PREMISE has low toxicity to people, pets and wildlife, while at the same time is extremely toxic to termites. Differences in toxicity are due to differences in nervous systems. People simply do not have what's required in their nervous systems for PREMISE to have a significant effect. That's why PREMISE has very little impact on animals other than susceptible insects.
Toxicity testing required by the Environmental Protection Agency has also shown PREMISE to cause only minimal secondary effects on humans and mammals. And better yet, the active ingredient in PREMISE, imidacloprid, works at low rates-up to 20 times less the active ingredient than some products.
A Breakthrough in Chemistry
Historically, when termites came in contact with a termiticide, they were controlled by one of two means. The termites were either immediately killed or they were repelled. Termiticides that repel are at a disadvantage because foraging termites will randomly attack your home until they eventually find a break in the defense barrier. Many pest control operators will also agree that treatineiits that control termites on contact can also create gaps in coverage.
The chemistry of Premise' 75 Insecticide brings to the industry a new method of termite control. Rarely has there been such an effective termiticide with as low of an environmental load of active ingredient as PREMISE. That's because of how PREMISE is designed to work. Termites do not detect PREMISE until it is too late.
Premise really Gets to Termites
PREMISE affects the behavior of termites. Immediately after exposure, termites stop all damaging activity. What makes PREMISE so outstanding is that this work stoppage occurs at a wide range of soil concentrations. When PREMISE is applied at labeled rates, high and low concentrations can exist within any given treated zone. Of course, termites contacting high concentrations of PREMISE are controlled quickly. But what separates PREMISE from other termiticides is that termites exposed to lower concentrations also stop feeding. By forming a treated zone around your home, PREMISE effectively stops termites at all points of contact.
To stop the termites' feeding process, pest control operators apply termiticides around and directly beneath the foundation of your house. The most effective treatment is the one that provides the most continuous treated zone between your home and the foraging termites. So to provide maximum protection, pest control operators drill holes in the floor and trench and/or rod around the outside of your house to inject the termiticide. The termiticide should then distribute throughout the soil along the foundation creating a seamless, treated zone.
And that's how Premise' 75 insecticide works. Through a process called Lateral Soil Movement, PREMISE spreads out through the soil upon application. When properly applied, the result is a treated zone with no breaks or weak spots. In fact, the treatment not only connects, but often overlaps the spaces between rod holes. Some termiticides display a very limited ability to spread out once injected into the soil. Take a look at the Lateral Soil Movement of PREMISE compared with these other termiticides.
And Lateral Soil Movement is important when you consider how persistent termites can be. When they come to a typical barrier, termites will often look for a small break to forage through. If there are any breaks or holes in your termiticide barrier, there's a good chance that termites may find their way through. Even the strongest concentration of a classical termiticide will prove to be ineffective if it does not make a complete barrier in the soil.
With Lateral Soil Movement, effective concentrations of PREMISE are found throughout the treated zone, even in areas furthest from the injection points. That's because PREMISE, if applied according to the label, is effective at a wide range of soil concentrations. The result is the most effective, initial contact performance in the business.
A Colony Directed toward One Common Cause-Survival
Admittedly, many people have never even seen a termite. That's because they stay well hidden. Termites thrive in dark, moist conditions, preferably in soil. On average, they leave their protective environment about once a year-a reproductive process known as "swarming." After successfully mating, they search for a new location to nest and feed.
Similar to ants, termites live in large interdependent colonies. These colonies operate much like a factory, numbering anywhere from 250,000 to, in some cases, over one million termites. Worker, soldier and reproductive termites have specific tasks to keep the whole system running. At the center of the colony is the queen and king whose joint purpose is reproduction. The worker termites' role is crucial: collect enough food to feed the entire colony, including the thousands of new larvae that are hatched each season. Termites feed on cellulose materials and are especially attracted to one particular source: wood. But how do they find it?
An Underground System of Mass Transit
Termites probe through the soil until they come in contact with a food source, a process known as "random foraging." From their colonies, these foragers can travel as far as 500 feet. Once a food source is located, they build a path to start their system of transporting the food back to the colony. In most cases, termites never expose themselves to light or open air, making their detection during feeding nearly impossible. Even in crossing over non-soil matter such as concrete, they'll build tubes composed of soil particles to keep themselves protected.
Everything is then in place for a system of mass food transportation. Thousands of termites will travel back and forth from the food source to the nest, carrying with them the sustenance the colony needs to survive.
For Premise' 75 insecticide to work effectively, pest control operators must follow certain application procedures. The techniques vary for each particular location treated. Here's a brief explanation of what a pest control operator typically does in applying PREMISE to your home.
Getting Beneath the Surface
Subterranean termites are controlled by establishing a treated zone next to and beneath the structure that's infested. The pest control operator can do this in a variety of ways. A shallow trench may be dug around the perimeter of your house. The applicator can either apply PREMISE directly to the trench, or instead, insert a rod through the trench and inject PREMISE down into the soil. In some cases, the applicator may opt not to trench at all, instead choosing to rod directly into the soil.
When rodding is done, the holes are spaced anywhere from two to six inches apart around the outside of the structure. From these rod holes, PREMISE spreads laterally throughout the soil, creating a treated zone between your home and the foraging termites.
It may also be necessary to apply PREMISE beneath the foundation itself. By drilling through the concrete slab, the pest control operator can inject proper concentrations of PREMISE to effectively establish a treated zone inside the foundation wall and around utility entrances. Later, these holes are neatly filled so that your home is in the same state it was before treatment.
Other structural areas that are examined are dirt-filled porches and chimney and wall voids. To get in these sometimes hard-to-reach areas, PREMISE can also be expanded into foam. It's a useful supplement to standard treatment techniques because foam will fill any void beneath slabs and porches and inside walls and chimneys that a liquid application can't reach. What's more, PREMISE is just as effective as a foam as it is as a liquid solution.
Simple Procedure made even Easier
When the pest control operator arrives to apply PREMISE, the areas to be treated will have to be made easily accessible. This may require moving furniture so that all areas such as hallways and crawl spaces are clear for passage. The pest control operator should always look for the least disruptive way to apply PREMISE to your home. When the treatment is finished, you should expect to find your home in the same order as it was found-but without the termites.
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