Common Furniture Beetle, Woodworm Anobium punctatum (Degeer)

Occurs commonly outdoors, attacking dead tree trunks and branches, fence posts and outbuilding door and window frames, and indoors in wood in a variety of situations.

The adults of this wood-boring beetle emerge from timber in the spring, and fly for mating and distribution. Sometimes mating takes place on the wood from which the female emerges, and here she immediately lays her eggs. The eggs are pressed into cracks and crevices, frequently the open-end grain of sawn and manufactured timber. An average of 30 eggs is laid per female and usually in groups of 2 or 3. “-4 weeks later the eggs hatch, and the larvae (woodworm) bore into the timber.

Throughout Britain the common furniture beetle is a serious pest indoors both in structural timbers and furniture. Polished wood surfaces are usually not attacked, but even the best furniture has exposed joints and unpolished areas unders drawers and in the joints of the frame.