• It's time to cast your vote in the April 2025 Turning Challenge. (click here for details)
  • Congratulations to Steve Bonny for "A Book Holds What Time Lets Go" being selected as Turning of the Week for 28 April, 2025 (click here for details)
  • Welcome new registering member. Your username must be your real First and Last name (for example: John Doe). "Screen names" and "handles" are not allowed and your registration will be deleted if you don't use your real name. Also, do not use all caps nor all lower case.

Bugs! (Ambrosia beetles)

Roger Wiegand

Roger Wiegand

Beta Tester
Joined
Nov 27, 2018
Messages
877
Likes
1,049
Location
Wayland, MA
Website
www.carouselorgan.com
So I just turned a couple of box elder bowls from wood I collected last summer. I'd previously rough turned some bowls for re-turning and noticed nothing untoward. i turned these as natural edge bowls to final thickness. When I picked them up today they were covered with small beetles, pictured below. They appear to be ambrosia beetles (Trypodendron lineatum, I think). The number of bugs that appeared from a thin bowl was fairly alarming. I understand they don't attack dry wood, but should I worry about them marching around my shop? I imagine a short stay in the microwave will do in any remaining critters.

Is this common? I've seen a lot of box elder pieces, but no discussion of live bugs in residence.

https://carouselorgan.smugmug.com/Woodworking/i-d6Jqb2s/A
0j9VP3oiRfK3ypeRRQM0bg-X2.jpg
 
Last edited:
I'm no expert. However, they probably won't be a problem to anything in your shop because they only feed on live trees...however, they are destroying soft maples (in particular) all across the USA. Curse them while they are in the micro.
 
Found this article that states that all species of ambrosia beetle require wood moisture content of at least 48%. No worries for anything in your shop, nor the shop itself. I'm sure microwave would kill them.

https://www.forestpests.org/gfcbook/ambrosia.html

Another thing that might work is to leave them in your (presumably) warm shop, and then when it turns very cold, move the infected wood outside. In nature, insects produce their own "antifreeze" as the temps start declining in the fall. When kept warm, they don't have the resistance to sudden, severe temperature drops. This can also work by throwing infested wood in the freezer, but in MA why not use nature?
 
A healthy box elder hardly has any color in it at all. That blue color in your piece is from the wood heading towards rot. Also for box elder to have red in it, the tree has to be under insect attack and not in good condition. I've never had any beetles in box elder I have, but I am not surprised someone found some.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top