bamboo pest

[junglebeachvietnam]

am building bugalows and furniture with bamboo,
no idea type of bamboo, but it is a very common bamboo here in Central Vietnam
there is a borer that eats through the bamboo, someone has called it "vrille" a very small worm type of animal, but I have no idea
it eats small lines in the bamboo, mostly inside, sometimes comes through the outside
so far, after about 5 years, the bamboo is very weak in spots

what can I do, I wish to find a way to do something without using nasty chemicals

here in VietNam, they usually saok it in water, or salt water or mud for a while, but after doing this, I find the bamboo tends to crack easily, especially when it hot, which is most of the time

so far, all i see on line is to soak or inject it with boric acid
we are using so much bamboo. it woul take forever to do this if we have to drill between each node and shoot the stuff in there

I do not want to use diesel and motor oil as most do around here as it makes the bamboo very dirty looking, and has to be redone yearly, making the bambbo turn black

any ideas out there

please let me know

[LovesMtns]

Hi all,
Most pests require oxygen to live. If you wrap the bamboo pole in plastic, and seal it with duct tape, and put in a cup or so or dry ice, it will create positive pressure of pure carbon dioxide in the plastic and smother the insects. I don't know how long it would take for those in culms, it would take some experimentation. But the insects reached directly by the carbon dioxide would smother and die very quickly.
Hope that helps.

[junglebeachvietnam]

your idea sounds good, but wrapping in plastic is not possible here, as we work with so much bamboo,
we have just received 450 pieces from 8 to 14 meters long, it would be impossible to wrap them all up...

i am aware of the idea that oxigen deprivation is what kills the bugs,

before, we have tried soaking in salt/ocean water, but i think our process was not correct ... bamboo was hard to get totally immersed, and was not covered, and it smelled very bad after 2 weeks,

after speaking with a couple of firms who do bamboo furniture for export here in vietnam, we have decided to try the salt method again, because we are not into the heavy chemicals they use

1/ we built a proper soaking pool, with roof to avoid sunshine
2/ we have used a steel rod to break the membranes of the knuckkles/joints to help with immersion
3/ we have added salt to get a 10 % saline solution
4/ we make sure all the bamboo is under water

we figure 1 month under water ought to do it
so far, without sunshine and so much salt, there are no critters livng in the water / frogs...
there is no smell unless we agitate the water, even then the smell is not anywhere as bad as it used to be

we have tried with strips, soaking for 2 weeks, and used them over the last 3 months, so far , so good, no signs of pests, (before the pests showed up in the strips in the 1st month of usage

we use this bamboo for furniture making as well as bungalow construction

i'll let you know how it goes