24 Sentences With "deathwatch beetle" | Random Sentence Generator

A deathwatch beetle is an insidious insect, eating away at furniture or homes, capable of destroying them if left undetected.

Hemicoelus gibbicollis, known generally as California deathwatch beetle, is a species of death-watch beetle in the family Ptinidae. Other common names include the Pacific powder post beetle and western deathwatch beetle. It is found in North America.

In 1988, Linda Pastan wrote a poem entitled "The Deathwatch Beetle". In 1995, Alice Hoffman made reference to the deathwatch beetle in her novel Practical Magic, using it as an omen of death; the main character hears it shortly before her husband dies.

Hemicoelus carinatus is a species in the subfamily Anobiinae ("death-watch beetles"), in the order Coleoptera ("beetles"). The species is known generally as the "eastern deathwatch beetle". It is found in North America.

This beetle is found in Europe, including the United Kingdom, as well as North America, Corsica, Algeria, and New Caledonia. Its natural habitat is dead or decaying hardwood, or in some cases coniferous wood, especially when the timber has been softened by fungal attack. This may be due to the way fungal decayed wood affects nitrogen metabolism in the deathwatch beetle. Decayed wood is also much easier for the larva of the deathwatch beetle to bore into which allows them to develop at a faster rate.

The church dates from the 12th century. The chancel roof was restored around 1895 and the nave roof, found to be infested with Deathwatch beetle, was restored in 1925. The royal coat of arms dates from 1720.

Ernest Cook (1865–1955) acquired numerous estates including Coleshill. Cook left his estates to the National Trust, which thus has owned the barn since 1956. Most of the modern farm buildings around the barn were demolished. In 1961 the Trust treated the timbers against deathwatch beetle and extensively restored the roof.

The pupa measures 7–8 mm in length and around 3 mm in width. The adult deathwatch beetle is cylindrical measuring on average long. The head is largely concealed by a brown thoracic shield. The shield and elytra are dark brown or reddish-brown, with a patchy felting of yellowish-grey short hairs.

A deathwatch beetle communicates by hitting its head on a substrate to create a noise, a method called tapping. Males and females differ in that males usually tap first, and females tap only in response to males. A female responds within 2 seconds of a male tap. After the female responds, a male will tap again from 2 to 30 seconds later.

In the 15th century the nave was given a new roof and the north aisle was added around the same time. Major restoration was undertaken in the 19th century when the porch was rebuilt and the height of the tower increased. Much of the woodwork in the church was carved by local craftsmen. In 1964 the roof had to be replaced because of deathwatch beetle.

The deathwatch beetle (Xestobium rufovillosum) is a species of woodboring beetle that sometimes infests the structural timbers of old buildings. The adult beetle is brown and measures on average long. Eggs are laid in dark crevices in old wood inside buildings, trees, and inside tunnels left behind by previous larvae. The larvae bore into the timber, feeding for up to ten years before pupating, and later emerging from the wood as adult beetles.

The deathwatch beetle is part of the beetle family Ptinidae, formerly known as Anobiidae. This includes a number of subfamilies including Ptininae, the spider beetles which are mostly scavengers, Anobiinae, wood-boring beetles, and Ernobiinae, deathwatch beetles, also wood-borers. In 1912, Pic erected Ernobiinae for beetles previously classified under Dryophilini by Fall in 1905. White elevated this taxon to subfamily status in 1962 and 1971, and in 1974 included 14 genera in the subfamily.

An adult female deathwatch beetle is short-lived (1–2 months) and must find a suitable host in which to lay her eggs relatively quickly. She is capable of using odor to locate wood that has been decayed by fungi, which provides an excellent host. When selecting a host, old wood (more than a century old) is favoured. Trees with deep crevices are also favoured, as they provide a dark safe shelter for the eggs.

The deathwatch beetle infests the structural timbers of old buildings, mostly attacking hardwood, especially oak. The initial attack usually follows the entry of water into a building and the subsequent decay of damp timber. Furniture beetles mainly attack the sapwood of both hard and soft wood, only attacking the heartwood when it is modified by fungal decay. The presence of the beetles only becomes apparent when the larvae gnaw their way out, leaving small circular holes in the timber.

However, adults of the deathwatch beetle are attracted to light. The sounds of the feeding larvae can be heard either unaided or with the help of a stethoscope, and X-ray scans and computer tomography can also be used. Similarly, active larvae may be identified by vibrations in the ultrasound range. The exit holes of deathwatch beetles are 2 to 3 mm (about 0.1 inch) in diameter, larger than those produced by the common furniture beetle.

Korynetes caeruleus also known as the steely blue beetle is a predatory beetle in the family Cleridae. The adult is between long, has reddish-brown antennae, a scantily spotted brown head and neck shield, and shiny blue elytra. The larvae live in tunnelled wood that has been infested by the common furniture beetle and the deathwatch beetle and they feed on the larvae of these wood- damaging insects. The presence of Korynetes caeruleus indicates a heavy infestation of either woodboring insect.

He left the parish in 1945 and was replaced by Trevor Wright, who was in charge when further problems were uncovered in the church during the 1950s. The woodwork was affected by deathwatch beetle and wet rot and repair work costing over £15,000 was needed. Mervyn Wedgewood took over as the vicar in 1956 as the town expanded further. He led the establishment of new classes and groups for the population and the construction of a new church dedicated to St Francis.

The steely blue beetle (Korynetes caeruleus) is a predator of the deathwatch beetle and of the common furniture beetle (Anobium punctatum). The adult female blue beetle lays her eggs in the exit holes made by the emerging borers, and the carnivorous larvae wander through the galleries made by the wood-borers, feeding on their larvae. The adult deathwatch beetles are weak fliers and may run over the surface of the timber, rather than fly. They are sometimes caught by spiders, their silk-encased husks being found on webs.

This beetle was first described in 1668 by John Wilkins, but it was not until 1913 that the first scientific study was conducted by Professor Lefroy in an attempt to come up with a management solution for these beetles. The larvae of deathwatch beetle feed deep within timbers. Recent studies have suggested that most of the previously accepted practices of external application of insecticides are largely ineffective. Only gas fumigation remains effective, but poses considerable practical challenges in effectively sealing the larger, historic types of properties that these beetles are mostly attracted to.

The specific year of construction is not known but thought to be between 1440 and 1470, although the porch which may be slightly later than other parts of the building has been dated to 1465. In 1823 the refectory was found to be in a bad state of repair and moneys allocated for the construction of the new vicarage. Major repairs were carried out to the refectory in the 1950s following the discovery of deathwatch beetle . The two-storey limewashed stone of the vicarage has a tiled hipped roof and Greek Doric distyle porch.

However, infestation by these beetles is often limited to historic buildings, because modern buildings tend to use softwoods for joists and rafters instead of aged oak timbers, which the beetles prefer. To attract mates, the adult insects create a tapping or ticking sound that can sometimes be heard in the rafters of old buildings on summer nights; therefore, the deathwatch beetle is associated with quiet, sleepless nights and is named for the vigil (watch) being kept beside the dying or dead. By extension, a superstition has grown up that these sounds are an omen of impending death.

The species of insects involved can sometimes be identified by examination of the fecal pellets in the frass. Adult beetles, alive or dead, may be present on the glass or the sills of windows, as may the specific enemies of the beetles in the same locations—a likely indication of specific wood-boring insects inside. Direct examination of the interior of the timber by destructive means is often not acceptable, and non-invasive means are required. Other means of identifying the wood-boring insects include pheromone traps; these are effective for the common furniture beetle and the house longhorn beetle (Hylotrupes bajulus) but not for the deathwatch beetle.

Also in Buckinghamshire was the Parasite Laboratory, part of the Imperial Bureau of Entomology in London, later the Commonwealth Institute of Entomology which produced the Bulletin of Entomological Research, and is now represented by CABI in Oxfordshire. From February to April 1928, an Empire Timber Exhibition was held at the Imperial Institute (now the site of Imperial College London). The Parasite Laboratory closed in 1940. In 1928, research was carried out across the UK into Dutch elm disease. In 1931 it carried out work into the Deathwatch beetle; the first investigation into this pest had been by Harold Maxwell-Lefroy at Imperial College in 1914.

It is possible that this essay influenced Edgar Allan Poe's 1843 short story "The Tell-Tale Heart" and that the sound the protagonist was hearing at the end of that story was that of a beetle tapping inside the wall, not the beating of the (dead) victim's heart. However, it is more likely that it was the metronomic ticking of a booklouse rather than the groups of six to eight taps made by the deathwatch beetle. The beetle was referenced in Mark Twain's 1876 The Adventures of Tom Sawyer: "Next the ghastly ticking of a deathwatch in the wall at the bed's head made Tom shudder – it meant that somebody's days were numbered." In Dorothy L. Sayers' Gaudy Night (chapter 17), the mechanism of the ticking of the death-watch beetle is discussed, and it is compared with a clicking sound made by an ill-fitting hard shirt front.