bexsa's Profile

Yeah angeltreats, the fewer the ingredients the better!

Irish soda bread is *never* made with white flour, mostly due the fact that up until recently we would not have had such fine flour. And I say "we" as an actual Irish person. There is no true soda bread recipe - I used to watch my grandmother make it just using her hands to measure, never any spoons, jugs or scales and nothing has ever compared to it. My mother who is an accomplished baker complains she just can't replicate it. If you want an Irish fruit loaf make some barmbrack instead!

If you're ever in Dublin:
http://www.museum.ie/en/exhibition/eileen-gray-introduction.aspx

this just reminds me of my Sindy doll kitchen as a child:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/amcam/157632870/

i love the logo-nice and materialistic!

sorry half asleep here, meant to read there is this MISCONCEPTION (:P) that they give off a field that is bad for you.... etc.....
maybe i need one to help me sleep better!

I work in a natural history museum, it is more than likely naphthalene, the very active ingredient in mothballs. Its probably the frame that they are in, and you will more than likely not get rid of of smell.
So you either need to live with the smell (and in a small amount like this it really isn't that bad, so long as they are not in a heavily used room) or get them re-framed.

The smell basically is masking the nice tasty snacks you have very neatly placed in pins for LIVE insects.
They probably do have a ball or significant amount of treatment sitting in with them so it won't just be aired away unfortunately....

oh sigh too! Think what its like to want to look for a morgate with 300% rise in house prices and the credit crunch, I love living in Dublin, would love more to OWN and live in Dublin!!

Its not very likely they are powder post beetles, they tend to only go for new wood (almost exclusivly) its more than likely furniture or death watch beetles and 2 weeks in a freezer will kill them off. I was on a pest management course this wednesday. Trust me on this one :P
The only way to tell conclusively is if there was dust/frass (frass=insect poop) that you would have to look under a microscope.
Gritty frass=furniture beetle
Rounded frass=deathwatch beetle
fine talc-like frass=powder post beetle

Please please please don't put them in the oven.
I work in a museum and we have to deal with these kind of problems all the time. Without moisture an oven will just destory them, and if you use a low heat, it won't do a thing to the bugs (if there are any alive).

You have 2 options:
Bag them up well-air tight! in a clear plastic and then:
a) place them somewhere safe away from anything else wooden, basically quarantine them. Then wait till Spring. This might not be termites it could be death watch beetles. Right now I couldn't tell you what they are or even if this if recent damage way unless they have any dust (or more specifically called frass) coming out of them. Even an exterminator wouldn't be able to tell you for sure one way or another without that (even if they tell you they can). By spring if there's anything living in there you will have bugs or frass.

b) Bag them the same way and freeze them. But you will have to freeze for 2 weeks to actually kill anything for sure. Also you will have to leave them bagged for about a day or two after you take them out to let them warm up again, otherwise water will condense on them and you'll get mould etc.

hope this helps! and main thing is they are totally treatable without horrid chemicals or any panic!