WA: Suburb on alert after termite found in desk from Guam

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WA: Suburb on alert after termite found in desk from Guam

By Selina Day

PERTH, Aug 6 AAP - An entire Perth suburb has been placed on alert after the discoveryof an exotic termite that can destroy buildings if it takes hold.

The termite was found in an imported wooden desk.

The householders whose desk is at the centre of the scare will be put up in a hotel- as will their neighbours - while authorities seal the house with a custom-made tarpaulinto destroy the foreign pest.

A public meeting was held overnight in the beachside suburb of Ocean Reef to explainthe dramatic fumigation, which will require cloaking the two-storey house.

Agricultural officers said the pest -- the exotic West Indian drywood termite fromsub-tropical Africa -- could destroy timber in buildings, and the harvested timber industryif it became established in Western Australia.

The bug is not a threat to agriculture.

A commercial pest controller found the Ocean Reef termite in a desk made in Guam afterthe householders, who recently moved to Perth from Hawaii, were worried about strangedamage to the furniture.

The Ocean Reef case was considered a one-off because the furniture had originated fromGuam and Hawaii, but authorities have asked people to be vigilant with wooden furniture.

A wooden box in the couple's garage and a picture frame had also been damaged by thetermite, the second occurrence in WA following a find five years ago.

Agriculture Department entomologist Peter Davis said the infested furniture was fumigatedwhen the termite was found in February, but the whole house would now be treated as aprecaution.

The blanketing of the house in its tailored tarpaulin would probably happen next week,depending on dry weather.

"The whole 'tent' covers the entire house and is sealed around the bottom and thenthe fumigant is pumped in and left there for 24 hours and that's sufficient to kill allthe termites in the house," said Mr Davis.

The couple and five lots of their neighbours, in homes surrounding the couple's house,will be put up in hotels.

"It is a serious pest and, from a safety point of view, (the Health Department) wouldbe more at ease having neighbours accommodated elsewhere," he said.

"In Western Australia this is quite a rare event."

The termite - which has a 20 to 30 year lag between when it is introduced and detected- is believed to have been discovered in Queensland in 1966 but entrenched there sinceWorld War II.

About 550 homes in Queensland have been fumigated from the pest since 1974 - includingthe sealing and spraying of Parliament House in Brisbane in the 1980s.

AAP sd/mg/mo

KEYWORD: TERMITES