Termites - Avoiding Termites

[Woody]

I am new to gardening on acreage, so please don't dismiss this question as irrelavent or too dumb.
I want to start up a compost heap, but i am worried that it may be a haven for those nasty termites that eat your house. The compost heap, will probably be sited on bare ground and not in a container off of the floor. I aim to put quite a lot of fresh wood chips into it. Am i asking for trouble?

[Chook Nut]

Hi Woody,

You shouldnt have too much problem as long as the heap is not right next to the house.

You can use chooks to help with your compost heaps and if you did get any termites in there the chooks would thank you for the protein they provide

Cheers... Dave

PS. Welcome to the forum.

[Gardening Rob]

And keep it good and wet - the worms will keep moving the stuff around which will help keep termites out of your heap.

Planting gum trees near your house will bring the rotten things in much quicker...

Rob

[makehumusnotwar]

hi woody.

as far as termites go, i haven't yet had much experience with them.
my only comment would be on the use of "quite a lot of fresh wood chips" being used in a compost heap. from what i've seen/learnt/heard, wood chips take forever to break down into humus so should only be used sparingly. this of course depends on how quickly you want to be able to use the end result of the heap.
i suppose, if you've got an excess of wood chips and you want to use them somehow, a compost heap or mulch would be better than nothing though.
efficiently constructed compost heaps should be too hot for termites as well as most other pests - some reaching between 70/80 degreesC at their core.

i've been in a little bit of a dilemma regarding termites as well. i don't want to use treated timber in my garden or surrounds, yet i'm not sure if untreated timber (in contact with the ground) will attract the termites towards the very nearby house. my area is pretty infamous for termites.

oh well, good luck anyway........

[Woody]

Thanks Guys,
i'll make sure the compost will be well away from the house, and near the chook pen i will eventually constuct that. I'm probably going to do a separate worm farmas i've heard these (if done correctly) can be great, and hopefully quicker, if my compost heap is preety large. I have plenty of trees on the land which, at their base should provide a good bit of leaf mulch.
I'll be moving to Gympie, QLD in a couple of weeks time, to 10 acres of sloping land. I'm very excited about this as it is a chance to fulfil a dream.
As i am a complete novice (only grown Tomatoes, Strawberries and a few herbs on a Sydney terrace) i will have many more questions for anyone willing to listen and/or help.

Cheers
Woody

[makehumusnotwar]

moving to gympie eh? i'm just down the road - plus a bit, and then a bit more....
we're also on 10 acres of sloping land.

once you're moved in, you should come along to the monthly permaculture noosa meetings in cooroy and the PET days. a fantastic resource for information, plus good fun.

also, a bit further down the road is maroochy permaculture community farm at yandina, with monthly meetings and workshops as well. i volunteer there whenever i can and have already learnt more than from reading a book. anyone else in the area - please check the place out - it is starving for volunteers. though only a couple of years old, it is well established but just needs more hands on deck.
there is a website - http://www.maroochypermaculture.org.au/

[Woody]

Hi,
education and fun at the same time, never thought it could really happen.
well i really will be a "green" volunteer.
Thanks for the invite/info.
My brother (Cairns) recently went to a similar meeting where everyone took along food/nibbles and enjoyed a talk on many things, he said it was great, but unfortunately he enjoyed a few too many home made cookies and felt even more green on the way home.
Cheers.

[gardenlen]

g'day woody,

welcome to the gympie area when you get here, if i can be of any assistance just yell we live 30k north of gympie and shop in gympie.

so long as you keep things like that a good distance from your house you should be ok, you may want to consider pest rpotection, we built with steel and cement so fits all council requirements and need no prevention methods.

i do all my composting in my garden beds, saves double handling have never seen any termites in my beds yet.

len

[Woody]

Thanks for the offer of help Len, i'm sure i'll take you up on that.
I'll be glad to offer my help to you and anyone else in the area, it wouldn't necessarily be any knowledge, but an extra pair of hands i'm sure would be of some benefit.
Cheers
Woody

[gardenlen]

g'day woody,

might be tempted to take you up on that plenty to do around here, we are still setting up only been here 3 years, got about 100 or so tube stock trees given to us still trying to get them into the ground and keep everything else progressing lol.

we opted for some 'warm-house' 'cool-house' design in our bungalow so no wood burners needed, no cooling either, need to build on the right aspect tho'.

give us a yell when you get up here if nothing else you can come have a look around.

dunno instead of us trying to grow some of everything for our needs we could do a share thingy hey could work all this out over that red (cask of course & out of a softdrink glass) that was mentioned before maybe in another post.

len :cool: