WORSE THAN HURRICANE DAMAGE - Termites destroy boats, and we've just been invaded!! (S1E5)

Know what other force of nature can destroy a boat? Termites! Hurricane damaged boats can be a walk in the park compared to repairing a boat damaged by termites, even if it isn't a wood boat. Backstory: Before we took on this refit, we got a practice run on a 36’ 1974 Trojan. It was a very well built fiberglass boat, but was in need of a fair amount of work due to a termite infestation. We got the boat outside of termite season, but boy were we in for a nasty surprise when we rolled into March and the colony woke up. There are many different termites, but the ones we came across look like ants with wings and swarm thousands at a time. After having replaced a majority of the wood in the boat, I had only left a few pieces. From those last few pieces, thousands of termites flew out overnight, and continued to do so for weeks. We fought them with bug bombs, borax, and discovered that fumigation is the only solution at that point. When it was all said and done, the termites had totally destroyed the interior of the boat, all in under a year. Every wall, shelf, and panel was chewed threw and needed to be replaced. Now: Our experiences lead us to take termites very seriously. Some species of termites can ingest as much as a pound of wood as a colony in a single day . . . no bueno! So you can imagine how horrified we were to discover a massive swarm of termites on our FULLY WOOD boat. The difference this time, all the termites we found had already dropped their wings, bad sign! We’ve had this boat for more than a year now, and not a single sign of termite activity (keep in mind we can see every inch of wood on our boat since it is gutted to ribs and stringers). In the same amount of time, our last boat fostered two different swarms, what we would call two seasons. They also start with their wings and leave the colony, then drop them upon arriving at a new site. Once establishing a colony, you will rarely see any sign of activity, as they stay in the wood. So what does all of this mean? They came from somewhere else, and chose us to be their next host! After a couple days of looking around the yard, and setting off $70 of bug bombs (enough to treat 60,000sqft) in an attempt to kill the intruders before they dig in, we found several massive colonies in the boatyard. The following evenings were accompanied by massive swarms of flying termites all over the yard as well. We contacted the yard to let them know about the issue, but were not met with a great response. After speaking with a neighbor who had also noticed the activity on property, we found out that the yard had told them that we brought the termites . . . nice. What is next? The yard has agreed to bring an exterminator to the property to walk around with us, so we will see what happens. This does put a huge damper on our project though, and definitely jeopardizes it’s future . . . We will see what next week brings! Also . . . Flour as a thickener? YES! This is something we have seen a couple times, but haven’t tried yet ourselves. In the past, we have been using the fine dust from sanding as an epoxy thickener, but the consistency isn’t always the same and it can be difficult to work with. So this week, we tried it . . . and love it! Flour seems to bring some of the best qualities of saw dust and silica, while being easy to work with and economical. We created a test piece with this mixture and let it soak in water for a few days, tune in next week for the results! Like our content? Join our Patron Community! https://patreon.com/Maroonedby5