Fumigation in Daly City, CA

Local Context

Tenting Answers a Drywood Problem, and Daly City Does Not Always Have One

Fumigation is the most complete treatment for widespread drywood termites, and the wrong tool for anything else. Vikane gas penetrates every void, joint and framing member inside a sealed structure, which is exactly what an infestation scattered through rafters and headers requires. It does not treat soil. A Reticulitermes colony living in the ground beside a Westlake foundation will still be there when the tent comes off, because it never lived in the wood full time.

That distinction matters more here than in most Peninsula cities. Persistent fog and about 20 to 24 inches of winter rain keep soil damp year-round, so subterranean findings dominate across the 1940s-to-1960s tracts. Drywood infestations do turn up — mostly in the older framing of Original Daly City, Top of the Hill and Crocker, and in the warmer eastern blocks near the I-280 corridor. When that damage runs through the roof framing and attic rather than one accessible member, tenting is the honest recommendation.

Daly City also adds logistics inland cities do not. Houses sit a few feet apart, many share or nearly share a wall, and street parking on the tract blocks is tight, so the crew needs a plan for the neighbors before the tarps come out. Wind coming off the ocean along Skyline Boulevard and above the Mussel Rock bluffs affects tarp handling and scheduling. We work all of that out during the pre-fumigation walk, not on the morning of.